The Confession: A Novel Read online

  In the process, Robbie Flak had spent all his money, burned every bridge, alienated almost every friend, and driven himself to the point of exhaustion and instability. He had blown the trumpet for so long that no one heard it anymore. To most observers, he was just another loudmouthed lawyer screaming about his innocent client, not exactly an unusual sight.

  The case had pushed him over the edge, and when it was over, when the State of Texas finally succeeded in executing Donte, Robbie seriously doubted if he could go on. He planned to move, to sell his real estate, retire, tell Slone and Texas to kiss his ass, and go live in the mountains somewhere, probably in Vermont, where the summers are cool and the state does not kill people.

  The lights came on in the conference room. Someone else was already there, opening up the place, preparing for the week from hell. Robbie finally left his car and went inside. He spoke to Carlos, one of his longtime paralegals, and they spent a few minutes over coffee. The talk soon turned to football.

  "You watch the Cowboys?" Carlos asked.

  "No, I couldn't. I heard Preston had a big day."

  "Over two hundred yards. Three touchdowns."

  "I'm not a Cowboys fan anymore."

  "Me neither."

  A month earlier, Rahmad Preston had been right there, in the conference room, signing autographs and posing for photos. Rahmad had a distant cousin who'd been executed in Georgia ten years earlier, and he had taken up the cause of Donte Drumm with big plans to enlist other Cowboys and NFL heavyweights to help wave the flag. He would meet with the governor, the parole board, big business boys, politicians, a couple of rappers he claimed to know well, maybe even some Hollywood types. He would lead a parade so noisy that the state would be forced to back down. Rahmad, though, proved to be all talk. He suddenly went silent, went into "seclusion," according to his agent, who also explained that the cause was too distracting for the great running back. Robbie, always on the conspiracy trail, suspected that the Cowboys organization and its network of corporate sponsors somehow pressured Rahmad.

  By 8:30, the entire firm had assembled in the conference room, and Robbie called the meeting to order. At the moment he had no partners--the last had left in a feud that was still tied up in litigation--but there were two associates, two paralegals, three secretaries, and Aaron Rey, who was always close by. After fifteen years with Robbie, Aaron knew more law than most seasoned paralegals. Also present was a lawyer from Amnesty Now, a London-based human rights group that had donated thousands of skilled hours to the Drumm appeals. Participating by teleconference was a lawyer in Austin, an appellate advocate furnished by the Texas Capital Defender Group.

  Robbie ran through the plans for the week. Duties were defined, tasks distributed, responsibilities clarified. He tried to appear upbeat, hopeful, confident that a miracle was on the way.

  The miracle was slowly coming together, some four hundred miles due north, in Topeka, Kansas.

  CHAPTER 3

  A few of the details were confirmed with little effort. Dana, calling from St. Mark's Lutheran and just going about her business of following up on those kind enough to visit their church, chatted with the supervisor at Anchor House, who said that Boyette had been there for three weeks. His "stay" was scheduled for ninety days, and if all went well, he would then be a free man, subject, of course, to some rather stringent parole requirements. The facility currently had twenty-two male residents, no females, and it was operated under the jurisdiction of the Department of Corrections. Boyette, like the others, was expected to leave each morning at 8:00 and return each evening at 6:00, in time for dinner. Employment was encouraged, and the supervisor usually kept the men busy in janitorial work and odd, part-time jobs. Boyette was working four hours a day, at $7 an hour, watching security cameras in the basement of a government office building. He was reliable and neat, said little, and had yet to cause trouble. As a general rule, the men were very well behaved because a broken rule or an ugly incident could send them back to prison. They could see, feel, and smell freedom, and they didn't want to screw up.

  About the cane, the supervisor knew little. Boyette was using it the day he arrived. However, among a group of bored criminals there is little privacy and an avalanche of gossip, and the rumor was that Boyette had been severely beaten in prison. Yes, everybody knew he had a nasty record, and they gave him plenty of room. He was weird, kept to himself, and slept alone in a small room behind the kitchen while the rest bunked down in the main room. "But we get all types in here," the supervisor said. "From murderers to pickpockets. We don't ask too many questions."

  Fudging a bit, or perhaps a lot, Dana breezily mentioned a medical concern that Boyette noted on the visitor's card he'd been kind enough to fill out. A prayer request. There was no card, and Dana asked for forgiveness with a quick petition to the Almighty. She justified the small and harmless lie with what was at stake here. Yes, the supervisor said, they'd hauled him to the hospital when he wouldn't shut up about his headaches. These guys love medical treatment. At St. Francis, they ran a bunch of tests, but the supervisor knew nothing more. Boyette had some prescriptions, but they were his business. It was a medical matter and off-limits.

  Dana thanked him and reminded him that St. Mark's welcomed everyone, including the men from Anchor House.

  She then called Dr. Herzlich, who was a thoracic surgeon at St. Francis and a longtime member of St. Mark's. She had no plans to inquire into the medical status of Travis Boyette, since such nosiness was far out of bounds and certain to go nowhere. She would let her husband chat with the doctor, with his door shut, and in their veiled and professional voices they might find common ground. The call went straight to voice mail, and Dana left a request for Herzlich to phone her husband.

  While she worked the phone, Keith was glued to his computer, lost in the case of Donte Drumm. The Web site was extensive. Click here for a factual summary, 10 pages long. Click here for a complete trial transcript, 1,830 pages long. Click farther down for the appellate briefs, with exhibits and affidavits, another 1,600 or so pages. A case history ran for 340 pages and included the rulings from the appeals courts. There was a tab for the Death Penalty in Texas, and one for Donte's Photo Gallery, Donte on Death Row, the Donte Drumm Defense Fund, How You Can Help, Press Coverage and Editorials, Wrongful Convictions and False Confessions, and the last one was for Robbie Flak, Attorney-at-Law.

  Keith began with the factual summary. It read:

  The town of Slone, Texas, population forty thousand, once cheered wildly when Donte Drumm roamed the field as a fearless linebacker, but now it nervously awaits his execution.

  Donte Drumm was born in Marshall, Texas, in 1980, the third child of Roberta and Riley Drumm. A fourth child arrived four years later, not long after the family moved to Slone, where Riley found a job with a drainage contractor. The family joined the Bethel African Methodist Church and are still active members. Donte was baptized in the church at the age of eight. He attended the public schools in Slone, and by the age of twelve was being noticed as an athlete. With good size and exceptional speed, Donte became a force on the football field, and at the age of fourteen, as a freshman, was starting linebacker for the varsity at Slone High School. He was named all-conference as a sophomore and junior, and had verbally committed to play for North Texas State before a severe ankle injury ended his career during the first quarter of the first game of his senior year. Surgery was successful, but the damage was done. The scholarship offer was withdrawn. He did not finish high school, because he was incarcerated. His father, Riley, died of heart disease in 2002, while Donte was on death row.

  When Donte was fifteen years old, he was arrested and charged with assault. It was alleged that he and two black friends beat another black youth behind the gymnasium at the high school. The case was handled through juvenile court. Donte eventually pleaded guilty and was given probation. When he was sixteen, he was arrested for simple possession of marijuana. By then, he was an all-conference linebacker and well-known
in town. The charges were later dismissed.

  Donte was nineteen years old when he was convicted in 1999 for the abduction, rape, and murder of a high school cheerleader named Nicole Yarber. Drumm and Yarber were seniors at Slone High School. They were friends and had grown up together in Slone, though Nicole, or "Nikki," as she was often called, lived in the suburbs while Donte lived in Hazel Park, an older section of town that is primarily black middle-class. Slone is one-third black, and while the schools are integrated, the churches and civic clubs and neighborhoods are not.

  Nicole Yarber was born in Slone in 1981, the first and only child of Reeva and Cliff Yarber, who divorced when she was two years old. Reeva remarried, and Nicole was raised by her mother and stepfather, Wallis Pike. Mr. and Mrs. Pike had two additional children. Aside from the divorce, Nicole's upbringing was typical and unremarkable. She attended public elementary and middle schools and in 1995 enrolled as a freshman at Slone High. (Slone has only one high school. Aside from the usual church schools for kindergartners, the town has no private schools.) Nicole was a B student who seemed to frustrate her teachers with a noted lack of motivation. She should have been an A student, according to several summaries. She was well liked, popular, very social, with no record of bad behavior or trouble with the law. She was an active member of the First Baptist Church of Slone. She enjoyed yoga, water-skiing, and country music. She applied to two colleges: Baylor in Waco and Trinity in San Antonio, Texas.

  After the divorce, her father, Cliff Yarber, left Slone and moved to Dallas, where he made a fortune in strip malls. As an absentee father, he apparently tried to compensate through expensive gifts. For her sixteenth birthday, Nicole received a bright red convertible BMW Roadster, undoubtedly the nicest car in the parking lot at Slone High. The gifts were a source of friction between the divorced parents. The stepfather, Wallis Pike, ran a feed store and did well financially, but he couldn't compete with Cliff Yarber.

  In the year or so before her disappearance, Nicole dated a classmate by the name of Joey Gamble, one of the more popular boys in school. Indeed, in the tenth and eleventh grades, Nicole and Joey were voted most popular and posed together for the school yearbook. Joey was one of three captains of the football team. He later played briefly at a junior college. He would become a key witness at the trial of Donte Drumm.

  Since her disappearance, and since the subsequent trial, there has been much speculation about the relationship between Nicole Yarber and Donte Drumm. Nothing definite has been learned or confirmed. Donte has always maintained that the two were nothing more than casual acquaintances, just two kids who'd grown up in the same town and were members of a graduating class of over five hundred. He denied at trial, under oath, and he has denied ever since, that he had a sexual relationship with Nicole. Her friends have always believed this too. Skeptics, however, point out that Donte would be foolish to admit an intimate relationship with a woman he was accused of murdering. Several of his friends allegedly said that the two had just begun an affair when she disappeared. Much speculation centers upon the actions of Joey Gamble. Gamble testified at trial that he saw a green Ford van moving slowly and "suspiciously" through the parking lot where Nicole's BMW was parked at the time she disappeared. Donte Drumm often drove such a van, one owned by his parents. Gamble's testimony was attacked at trial and should have been discredited. The theory is that Gamble knew of Nicole's affair with Donte, and as the odd man out he became so enraged that he helped the police frame their story against Donte Drumm.

  Three years after the trial, a voice analysis expert hired by defense lawyers determined that the anonymous man who called Detective Kerber with the tip that Donte was the killer was, in fact, Joey Gamble. Gamble vehemently denies this. If it is true, then Gamble played a significant role in the arrest, prosecution, and conviction of Donte Drumm.

  A voice jolted him from another world. "Keith, it's Dr. Herzlich," Dana said through the phone's intercom.

  Keith said, "Thanks," and paused for a moment to clear his mind. Then he picked up the phone. He began with the usual pleasantries, but knowing the doctor was a busy man, he quickly got down to business. "Look, Dr. Herzlich, I need a little favor, and if it's too sticky, just say so. We had a guest during the worship service yesterday, a convict in the process of being paroled, spending a few months at a halfway house, and he's really a troubled soul. He stopped by this morning, just left actually, and he claims to have some rather severe medical problems. He's been seen at St. Francis."

  "What's the favor, Keith?" Dr. Herzlich asked, as if he were staring at his wristwatch.

  "If you're in a rush, we can talk later."

  "No, go ahead."

  "Anyway, he claims to have been diagnosed with a brain tumor, a bad one, glioblastoma. Says it's fatal, says he'll be dead soon. I'm wondering how much of this you can verify. I'm not asking for confidential info, you understand? I know he's not your patient, and I don't want anyone to violate procedures here. That's not what I'm asking. You know me better than that."

  "Why do you doubt him? Why would anyone claim to have a brain tumor when he really doesn't?"

  "He's a career criminal, Doctor. A lifetime behind bars and all that, probably not sure where the truth is. And I'm not saying I doubt him. He had two episodes of severe headaches in my office, and they were painful to watch. I'd just like to confirm what he's already said. That's all."

  A pause, as if the doctor were looking around for eavesdroppers. "I can't pry too deep, Keith. Any idea who the doc is here?"

  "No."

  "All right. Give me a name."

  "Travis Boyette."

  "Got it. Give me a couple of hours."

  "Thanks, Doctor."

  Keith hung up quickly and returned to Texas. He continued with the factual summary:

  Nicole disappeared on Friday night, December 4, 1998. She had spent the evening with girlfriends at a cinema in the only mall in Slone. After the movie, the girls--four of them--ate pizza at a restaurant that was also in the mall. Entering the restaurant, the girls chatted briefly with two boys, one of whom was Joey Gamble. Over pizza, the girls decided to meet at the home of Ashley Verica to watch late-night television. As the four girls left the restaurant, Nicole excused herself to use the ladies' room. Her three friends never saw her again. She called her mother and promised to be home by midnight, her curfew. Then she vanished. An hour later, her friends were concerned and were making calls. Two hours later, her red BMW was found where she'd left it in a parking lot at the mall. It was locked. There was no sign of a struggle, no sign of anything wrong, no sign of Nicole. Her family and friends panicked, and the search began.

  The police immediately suspected foul play and organized a massive effort to find Nicole. Thousands volunteered, and through the days and weeks that followed, the city and county were scoured as never before. Nothing was found. Surveillance cameras at the mall were too far away, out of focus, and of no benefit. No one reported seeing Nicole leave the mall and walk to her car. Cliff Yarber offered a reward of $100,000 for information, and when this sum proved ineffective, he raised it to $250,000.

  The first break in the case came on December 16, twelve days after her disappearance. Two brothers were fishing on a sandbar in the Red River near a landing known as Rush Point, when one of them stepped on a piece of plastic. It was Nicole's gym membership card. They poked through the mud and sand and found another card--her student ID issued by Slone High. One of the brothers recognized the name, and they immediately drove to the police station in Slone.

  Rush Point is thirty-eight miles due north of the city limits.

  The police investigators, led by Detective Drew Kerber, made the decision to sit on the news about the gym membership and ID cards. They reasoned that the better strategy was to find the body first. They conducted an exhaustive, though futile, search of the river for miles east and west of Rush Point. The state police assisted with teams of divers. Nothing else was found. Authorities as far away as a hundred miles do
wnriver were notified and asked to be on the alert.

  While the search of the river was under way, Detective Kerber received an anonymous tip implicating Donte Drumm. He wasted little time. Two days later, he and his partner, Detective Jim Morrissey, approached Donte as he was leaving a health club. Several hours later, two other detectives approached a young man named Torrey Pickett, a close friend of Donte's. Pickett agreed to go to the police station and answer a few questions. He knew nothing about the disappearance of Nicole and was not concerned, though he was nervous about going to the police station.

  "Keith, it's the auditor. Line two," Dana announced through the intercom. Keith glanced at his watch--10:50 a.m.--and shook his head. The last voice he wanted to hear at the moment was that of the church's auditor.

  "Is the printer full of paper?" he asked.

  "I don't know," she fired back. "I'll check."

  "Please load it up."

  "Yes, sir."

  Keith reluctantly hit line two and began a dull but not extended discussion of the church's finances through October 31. As he listened to the numbers, he pecked away at his keyboard. He printed the ten-page factual summary, thirty pages of news articles and editorials, a summary of the death penalty as practiced in Texas, Donte's account of life on death row, and when informed that the printer was out of paper, he clicked on Donte's Photo Gallery and looked at the faces. Donte as a child with parents, two older brothers, one younger sister; Donte as a small boy wearing a choir robe in church; various poses of Donte the linebacker; a mug shot, front page of the Slone Daily News; Donte being led in handcuffs into the courthouse; more photos from the trial; and the annual file photos from prison, beginning in 1999 with a cocky glare at the camera and ending in 2007 with a thin-faced, aging man of twenty-seven.