The Lincoln Lawyer

Mick is almost completely focused on pre-trial preparation for the Roulet case. Levin is digging to find as much evidence as possible. The prosecution has discovered the identity of Mr. X: Charles Talbot, a regular with the sex workers that work out of the same bar as Reggie Campo. Charles Talbot has a solid alibi that places him at his business (a convenience store) during the time of the crime. Levin discovers more about Reggie: Her website advertises her as being open to S&M, which won’t play well with the jury. Levin also finds out that Roulet was a troubled student who bounced around to private schools and bought essays from other students in order to pass. Levin finds multiple people who describe Roulet as violent and manipulative. Two women claim that he spiked their drinks and then raped them: One had her blood tested the next day and found traces of an animal sedative.

Mick and Levin interview Mary Windsor, Roulet’s mother, about her rape. When she tells the same version as Roulet, Levin and Mick are horrified to admit that it seems plausible that Roulet was there when his mother was attacked. Levin takes his theory further, asserting that “Roulet is evil” (255) and probably attacked and raped his own mother. As Roulet’s defense attorney, Mick must make sure that this information stays out of the trial, but he is also planning to use it against Roulet in whatever way he can. 

At 11:05 am, Lorna calls Mick to tell him that he has won the Harold Casey appeal: The judges agreed that the low-flying helicopter violated Casey’s right to privacy, so the prosecution’s evidence would have to be thrown out. Mick asks Lorna to make ten copies of the statement so that Casey can pass them around to advertise Mick’s services to fellow inmates. Mick is ecstatic at his win and calls Teddy Vogel (leader of the Road Saints) to give him the good news.

One month before trial, Mick has a rare day off. He is getting ready to meet Levin at Dodgers Stadium for the first game of the season. Levin has purchased a box for Mick and other defense attorneys as a thank-you for their business. Mick is planning to meet Levin early to catch up on new information that Levin found. However, Levin is a no show. Mick calls Levin, but gets no answer. During the first inning, Mick receives a call from Detective Lankford: Raul Levin is dead. The detective asks Mick to come to the scene right away. 

Raul Levin’s body is lying face down in his home office. Mick decides Roulet must have killed Levin because Levin was getting too close to the truth. Mick feels immensely guilty because he had hired Levin to investigate Roulet in the first place.

Eventually, detectives Lankford and Sobel tell Mick that Levin was sitting in his office desk chair facing the intruder when he was shot. He then fell forward and landed on the floor. The intruder seems to have ransacked the office after killing him; the detectives are hoping Mick can help point to what the intruder might have taken or been looking for. Mick explains that Levin had been most recently working on a rape and attempted murder case that’s about to go to trial, but he lies that there is no reason to suspect Roulet of murdering Levin. Mick has a different plan for how to get Roulet, something he and Levin had been working on.

Detective Lankford makes his contempt for defense attorneys and their investigators very clear. He also reveals that Levin is an ex-cop, and gay. Lankford seems to think that Levin was murdered for being gay. When Sobel takes over and asks Mick to help point them toward a suspect, Mick tells them about Gloria Dayton’s case (without using her name) and points them toward the drug dealer Hector Arrande Moya. Mick thinks this information will keep them from looking any closer at Roulet.

The detectives ask Mick to follow them into the office, where he will have to see Levin’s dead body. As soon as Mick sees him, he regrets it; he knows that this horrible image of the dead Levin with his eyes open will never leave his memory, and he doesn’t want to remember his friend this way. Mick doesn’t see anything unusual on Levin’s desk other than Levin’s chart tracking his hours. Detective Lankford remarks that before dying, Levin folded his left hand to make the sign of devil horns: “It’s like a signal. A code. He’s telling us that the devil did it” (275). Mick assumes that this is Levin’s way of telling him that Roulet, the man Levin called evil, is the one who shot him. 

Mick heads to the Four Green Fields bar to drink heavily. He calls the other lawyers that Levin worked for to tell them what happened. Then he calls Lorna, who immediately assumes Levin was killed by or because of Roulet. Mick insinuates that the detectives are looking into the fact that Levin was gay as the main motive for his murder. He doesn’t want anyone suspecting Roulet at this point. Lorna is very upset and calls into question their line of work; she no longer wants to defend the types of criminals who commit these murders. Mick tells Lorna that Levin was working on Jesus Menendez’s case before he died, and that they have to continue doing their work to help get an innocent man free.

Roulet calls Mick’s cell phone to give his condolences: The same detectives just informed him that Levin was murdered. Mick tells Roulet that under no circumstances should he speak with the police or any detective without his lawyer present. Roulet agrees. When Mick asks Roulet where he was that morning, Roulet says he was at his office alone until his assistant arrived at 10 am.

Mick then calls Fernando Valenzuela: Roulet’s tracking bracelet confirms that Roulet went from his home to his office and was nowhere near Levin’s house. Mick assumes that Roulet must have a trick or means of removing the tracking device, but Valenzuela explains that if he had removed the device or let its battery drain to below ten percent, it would set off an alarm. Valenzuela says there is no way to get around this device, short of cutting off his leg. Mick is convinced, but warns Valenzuela that Roulet is dangerous.

The bartender tricks Mick into giving him his car keys and tells him he cannot drive after getting so drunk. Mick calls Maggie for a ride home. 

Maggie arrives to drive Mick home, helping him stumble out to her car. Mick explains that he and Levin worked together for a long time, but it wasn’t until Levin helped Mick get through his divorce from Maggie that they really became close friends. Maggie helps Mick into bed.

He puts on a CD of Tupac’s music, compiled by a former client who died in a drive-by shooting. Maggie is surprised that Mick listens to this, and he explains that it helps him understand his clients better. He asks her why she sticks by his side even though she hates his line of work and they are divorced. She replies that there is “a good man and a good father in there waiting to break out one day” (291). Mick wants to leave the law and use his fleet of Town Cars to become a limo driver and asks Maggie to tape a one-dollar bill on the wall if she will be his first client.

Mick used to be afraid he wouldn’t recognize an innocent client when he got one, but now realizes he should have been afraid of “evil. Pure evil” (292). He says that he can’t be a lawyer any longer and passes out. 

Mick wakes up hung over and barely remembers how he got home. Then he sees a dollar bill taped to his wall and recalls his conversation with Maggie.

He gets ready for his day, which includes defending a client who was pulled over and arrested when the police found a pipe in her car. Mick will argue that because the pipe was concealed in a closed center console, the police did not have the right to search that area. Before leaving, he checks his voicemail and discovers that he received a call from Levin at 11:07 am the previous day: Levin’s final call. In the message, Levin says that he found some information that could get Jesus out of San Quentin. Then Mick hears the sound of Levin’s dog barking and Levin quickly hangs up. Mick understands that he probably just heard Levin’s dog barking at the intruder arriving at the door.

Mick decides he can’t keep this information from the police, so he calls Detective Sobel. Sobel accidentally reveals that they have found a bullet casing and know that the murder weapon was a Woodsman gun. Mick tells Sobel about Levin’s message. She wonders why he didn’t mention the message yesterday, requests his written consent to access his phone records, and asks to come to his house to talk with him. Once she hangs up, Mick realizes why Detective Sobel is acting so suspiciously: Mick inherited a Woodsman gun from his father. He has never even taken it out of the box, but it is registered in his name. He goes to his closet and opens the box to find that his gun is gone.