Grass Roots Read Online Free PDF

on Thursday night, and I said! “No, I told you, I was home with Charlene.”
     
    “
     
    “What else?”
    “That was about it, I guess. He left me in the office with the deputy while he went to look at the van. I guess he was gone about twenty minutes, and I read a magazine.
    Then he came back and told me I was under arrest for murder, and he showed me the warrant, and he read me my rights again, that time from a card. Then they made me empty my pockets, and they put me in a cell.”
    “Did he tell you that you could make a phone call?”
    “Oh, yeah. I called out to the Magi Mart a couple times, but the line was busy. Charlene is working today. I didn’t know who else to call. I could have called my boss, I guess, but I didn’t want him to know I was in jail. I said I didn’t know a lawyer and couldn’t afford one, and the sheriff said they’d get one for me.”
    Will took the young man through his life story, making notes. Larry Moody was twenty-four; born and raised in La Grange, twenty miles away; finished high school, made Bs and Cs; father died when he was six, mother worked in a mill, died when he was nineteen; played center on the football team; went to work for Morgan & Morgan after high school, they taught him about furnaces and air conditioners;
    had lived in Greenville, where his company had a branch, for just over a year.
    “Good,” Will said.
    “Now, there’s something I have to know, and I want you to tell me the absolute truth. Have you ever been in any kind of trouble? Have you ever been arrested? For anything? I’ll tell you right now, Larry, if you have, it’ll come out. You’d best tell me now. Have you ever been in trouble?”
    Larry, for the first time, looked away from him.
    “Yes, sir,” he said quietly.
    “Tell me about it,” Will said, “and don’t leave anything out.”
    “Well, when I was twenty, I had three speeding tickets in a row, over about four months. They took my license away from me, except for work.
    After I got it back, I bought the van. The van is pretty slow.” “That’s it?” Will asked, afraid to be relieved.
    “That’s all the trouble you were ever in?”
    “Yes, sir, that’s it.”
    “Was any of them a DUI? Were you drinking?”
    “No, sir.”
    Will took a deep breath and let it out.
    “All right, if you think of anything else, you can tell me later. Now, I want you to give me the names and addresses of three or four people who you think might have a good opinion of you.”
    Larry gave him the names of a high school teacher, his football coach, and his boss.
    “Now, I want you to give me some names of people you don’t get along with, who dislike you.”
    Larry looked puzzled, then stared at the ceiling for a moment.
    “I can’t think of anybody,” he said finally.
    “You don’t have any enemies at all?”
    Larry shook his head.
    “Not that I know of,” he said.
    “Okay, Larry, if you say so. Do you go to church in Greenville? Do you have a minister?”
    “No, sir. I’m not very religious, I guess.”
    Will put his legal pad away.
    “Now, here’s what’s going to happen next: you’re going to have to spend the weekend here; you’ll have a preliminary hearing on Monday morning, at ten. At that time. Judge Boggs will hear from the prosecution about their case, and he’ll decide if there’s a case to answer. The prosecution will present witnesses, but maybe not all they’ve got, and we’ll start to have an idea of what they think they’ve got on you. If the Judge decides they have a good-enough case, he’ll send your case to a grand jury, and if they think there’s enough evidence against you to warrant a trial, they’ll indict you, and then you’ll be tried.”
    “How long will all this take?” Larry asked.
    “Am I going to be stuck in here?”
    “We can try for bail at the preliminary hearing. Do you have any property?”
    “Just the van, and it won’t be paid up for another three years.”
    “Do you own your