Page 47 of This Is Law 3
I drove quickly, going out of the cemetery. It didn’t feel like I started breathing again until I was out. I made it to the light, and my hand went over my chest, as I thought about what the hell just happened. Do you know how fuckin crazy you must be to walk up to a casket, with family, and friends standing by, alreadygrieving from losing their loved one, and you go up, and shoot the casket up like that? I’m from Miami, so I’ve seen a lot of shit, but even this was different for me, and out of the norm. I had no idea who the hell that person was, but obviously Kross dying wasn’t enough because they wanted to shoot his ass up again, even in his death.
Damn, I was wondering if it was Law that did that shit? All this Miami beef going on with Dutch, and Law, I couldn’t help but to wonder if Law had done it. We’ll more than likely never know. What I learned about Miami is that secrets here get buried so deep, and even if they ever came out, it wouldn’t be until years later.
I loved the city that I was from, and the good that I’ve done here, but these days, nothing kept me here, so once I was finished touring, I’d made up my mind that I wanted to move to Cali. The love out there for me was ten times better than what I received here. At first, family, and friends were keeping me here, but these days, it felt like whenever I got around family and friends, someone always had their hand out. My relationship with my grandmother was pretty much the same. I was still paying all her bills, and with that, of course, I wasn’t receiving a thank you message from her.
There were times when I wanted to just skip out on paying anything for the month because I knew that that would get her attention, but I just didn’t have it in me to do that to her. There was this piece of me that felt like I owed her, since she was the one that raised me when my mom didn’t want to do it.
So, for sure Cali was going to be the move. The only person that I really talked about it with was Yaya. She was all for it. She supported me getting out of Miami, venturing off, and starting a new life out there. I would still be one of her clients because Lord knows that I couldn’t navigate in this industry without her. I hadno idea what I was going to do when she went on maternity leave after having her babies, but I’m sure I was going to get through.
I was heading back to my spot that I had here, where I would wait for my driver, so that he could take me back to the airport, and I would just shoot back to Texas, so that I could prepare for my show tonight. I came to Miami to pay my respects to Kross, and I was out just like that.
Hopefully, if that shit was true what they say about it being another lifetime, he would get his and do it right this time. I could only hope so.
Chapter Nineteen
SEVYN ‘LAW’ CRAWFORD
I was in the meeting room with all my attorney’s. Today, Reggie would be given his sentence in court, and we were all bunched up in here, waiting to see what the verdict was going to be. While everyone was sitting, I was in the back of the room standing, with my arms crossed, already knowing how this shit was going to play out, but I still was locked in like everyone else. For the months that Dominic had this case, he had been show boating, thinking that he was the illest nigga in Miami, and like he had some kind of magic that other attorneys didn’t have. Because I had that case before he did, I knew that there wasn’t much saving for Reggie. In all my years of being in the game, that was one case that I wasn’t too confident about. I was going to put all the work in, just as I would any other client, but it really would be performing a miracle because he had his hands in too many things, and too much evidence was up against him.
Judge Morris had this case. He was the same judge that had denied him his bond, and he turned around, and did the same thing to Dutch. I’ve been in Judge Morris’s courtroom plenty of times, and I knew that he was tough. The nigga was fair though. Come at him with facts, evidence to back up the shit you wereclaiming, and you would have your way with him. People went wrong with judge Morris because they wouldn’t be prepared.
Because I wasn’t a hating ass nigga, I’ll give Dominic his credit where it was due, and say that him, and his team did the best that they could do with what was against them. He wasn’t as performative in court, making it about him as I thought he would be, but he had been eating up the press, loving the attention that he was getting. A lot was at stake for him. Reggie had fans all over the world that were counting on him, so Dominic did all that he could do in court to help him get out of the fucked-up situation that he was in.
I watched as judge Morris cleared his throat, and he leaned up closer into the mic that was in front of him.
“On count one, which is racketeering under the RICO statue, how do you find the defendant?” judge Morris asked. Those seconds, where we waited for a member of the jury to respond sounded like the longest seconds in the world.
“Guilty,” a woman who looked to have been in her late 50’s responded. She was a black woman, who probably never heard a song from Reggie a day in her life, which was good because it showed that she wouldn’t be biased.
The camera paneled over to Reggie, who was standing up next to Dominic. Reggie cleaned up nice, rocking a navy-blue Armani suit. He was already a small dude, but you could tell that he was under a great amount of stress with this case, so looking at him, he was even smaller than he was from the last time that I’d seen him. His face looked a little sunken in as well. Shit never made me feel good when I had to see another black young man get all that time because it made me think of my boys. Reasons like this is why I went so hard on Creed, and Legend because I never wanted them to have to stand in front of a judge and receive such harsh sentencing.
“On count two, conspiracy to murder, how do you find?” judge Morris asked the member of the jury again.
“Guilty,” she responded after about three seconds. When that was called out, all I could do was shake my head because his life was over.
I heard his mama, and baby mama scream out. His mom was standing next to his baby mama, who was holding their daughter in her arms. All that tough shit went out the window for Reggie because when the camera was placed back on him, you saw that tear fall from his eye because even he knew his life was over.
“Count three, distribution of controlled substances, how do you find the defendant?” judge Morris asked again.
“Guilty,” she read the verdict again.
By the 5thguilty verdict, I mentally tapped out. Seeing the way they had to pull his mama out of that courtroom because the shit was too heavy for her, it put me in a position where I couldn’t even bear to watch it. I had black boys, so certain stuff I couldn’t stand to look at. Reggie was still a young nigga. Hadn’t even made it to see twenty- five, and his life was now over.
At the end, when I tapped back in, forcing myself to listen to the judge read off all those charges again, and give out the 85-year sentence that he would receive, it felt like the room was spinning. Reasons like this is why I would never let a motha fucka convince me that selling dope was cool. It was a risk that you took being out on that block. Yeah, the shit came with street credit, fame, money, nice cars, jewelry, and shit, but moving weight wasn’t the only way that a black man could put money in his pockets.
“85 years. Damn man! What the fuck was Dominic, and his team doing? They didn’t get a single ‘not guilty’ verdict. They found him guilty of every single last charge. That is crazy. He about to catch a lot of heat with this one,” one of the attorney’s Alex came over, and said to me. I couldn’t agree with him more.
“Cashed out all that money to him, and nothing worked in his favor. He could have gotten a public defender if this was the case. I get the RICO charge, and I even understand the conspiracy too. Too much evidence was on him to get him out of that shit, but the distribution? He didn’t have to get a guilty verdict on that. That shit could have gone towards the other niggas in his crew. Even the money laundering could have been thrown out the window because those are the easiest to turn into a paper trail fight. We can argue what that nigga could have done until we’re blue in the face. Fact of the matter is, it’s a strong chance that he wasn’t walking out of there regardless,” I finished.
“I don’t know, Law. I feel like you would have gotten him off. Nobody not fuckin with you,” Alex hyped me. I stuck my hand out, so that I could shake it up with my boy, and I listened to what some of my attorney’s in the room were saying, loving to hear their point of views, and what they would have done differently.
All of us were fiends for this kind of lawyer talk, so I sat in here with them for at least thirty minutes, loving the debates that I was hearing, and jumping in whenever I saw fit.
I eventually left out of the meeting room, so that I could head back to my office. I had a few things that I needed to look over before my next client that was coming in a little over an hour. I had a flat screen TV in my room, and I kept the TV live on the courthouse, wanting to see what else was going on.
I was sitting at my desk, looking over an email when I saw that the camera crew filming Dominic walking out. He had his head held high, still walking with that cocky ass walk, even though they just finished having a field day in court with his client.
“Attorney Dominic, talk to us a little bit about what just happened this morning in court. Do you think that the verdictwas fair? Would you, and your team have done anything differently?” one of the reporters asked him. Like he was offended with the question that was asked of him, he sucked his teeth and gave him a look like he wanted to take that mic from out of his hand and beat him with it.
