LIEUTENANT (JUNIOR GRADE) SAMUEL WEINBERG USN (Kevin Pollak), in A Few Good Men , was a young Navy JAG (Judge Advocate General's Corps) officer assigned to the JAG Office of the Washington Navy Yard. On 9 September 1991 he found himself assigned as co-counsel on a case he would much rather have prosecuted: United States Government v. Lance Corporal Harold W. Dawson USMC and Private First Class Louden Downey USMC. But that was before the trial began, and his friend and lead counsel, Lt. (jg) Daniel A. Kaffee USN, developed evidence that changed the whole complexion of the case.Sam Weinberg, at the time this narrative began, had just become a father. His little girl was just getting to the age of trying to say her first word. She just looks like she's got something to say, he said to Captain Whitaker, the Officer in Charge.He had always been in awe of Lionel Kaffee, former Navy Judge Advocate, then famed civil-rights attorney, a trial advocate that could have been the model for Perry Mason or Atticus Finch, and finally Attorney General of the United States. But he was far less in awe of the son. And when the OIC described the case of Dawson and Downey, he begged to be excused. He pleaded having a ton of paperwork on his desk, and was sure Kaffee would dispose of the case in four days.He said that of Kaffee mainly because Kaffee was one of the most successful litigators in the Washington Navy Yard JAG office. In nine months with the JAG Corps he had successfully plea-bargained 44 cases. Weinberg was in fact familiar with the case of Signalman 2/C McDermont, accused of possession--of a dime bag of oregano--and being under the influence thereof while on duty. Ultimate sentence: C misdemeanor, fifteen days restricted duty.But the real reason was that the facts of the case revolted him from the start. Those facts, as the OIC described them, were these:Dawson and Downey were members of Rifle Security Company Windward, Marine Ground Forces, Guantanano Bay, Cuba. Dawson, on or about 2 August 1991, illegally fired a round from his weapon across the fenceline into Cuban territory. A member of his squad, Pfc. William T. Santiago USMC, witnessed it and wrote to the Naval Investigative Service offering to give Dawson's name in exchange for a transfer out of RSC Windward.At or before midnight 7 September 1991, Dawson and Downey, yet another member of his squad, entered Santiago's barracks room, seized him, tied him hand and foot, stuffed a rag down his throat, and taped it in place. An hour later Santiago was dead. The base hospital doctor diagnosed acute pulmonary hemorrhage due to lactic acidosis, and the nature of the acidosis suggested poisoning.Charges: murder in the first degree, conspiracy to commit murder, and conduct unbecoming United States Marines.The story they told was that they did not use poison and they were merely doing a hazing drill, with no intent to kill. Weinberg was buying none of it. As he would tell Kaffee later, he believed every word of the story they told. And yet he believed they ought to go to prison for the rest of their lives. And why? Because they beat up on a weakling. That's all they did. Everything else was just smoke-filled coffeehouse crap. They tortured and tormented a weaker kid. They didn't like him, so they killed him. And why? Because he couldn't run very fast.That last spoke to why Division had somehow gotten a prompting to move Dawson and Downey off Gitmo and to the Yard, and to assign counsel. They requested Kaffee--for reasons Weinberg wouldn't figure out until Kaffee himself figured it out and told him much later. The bottom line on Santiago: he was a screw-up. He kept a sloppy barracks room and fell behind on runs.That became clear when they went to see Lt. Cdr. JoAnne Galloway USN, Special Counsel for Internal Affairs. What her interest was in the case, Weinberg couldn't figure out, and Kaffee resented. Kaffee was sure he could get the judge advocate to knock out the conspiracy and conduct-unbecoming charges and knock the murder charge down to second degree. Sentence: twelve years. They'd be home in half that time. Why? Because Santiago had written fourteen letters begging for a transfer. Letters that did not exactly paint a flattering picture of Marine life. Furthermore, any protracted investigation risked causing embarrassment to the base ground forces CO, Col. Nathan R. Jessup USMC, who was about to be appointed Director of Operations, National Security Council.But Galloway was not impressed nor satisfied. And as Special Counsel for Internal Affairs, she had the jurisdiction to order him to go deeper than that. The next day, Kaffee, with Weinberg in tow, saw Dawson and Downey for the first time. Kaffee ran the interrogation for the most part. He asked Dawson what a Code Red was. A Code Red is a disciplinary engagement, said Dawson. Translation: officially sanctioned hazing. Garden-variety example: a Marine refuses to bathe on the regular basis. The men in his squadron give him a GI shower: scrub brushes, Brillo pads, steel wool, and so on. Beautiful. And yes, the attack on Santiago was a Code Red.Weinberg contributed this much: he asked L. Cpl. Dawson whether he had discharged his weapon into enemy territory on 2 August. Answer: yes. Why? My mirror engaged. Kaffee pointed out Santiago alleged the mirror did not engage. And then he said, If Santiago had nothing on you, why did you have to give him a Code Red? Answer: Because he broke the chain of command. The purpose of the Code Red? To train him, sir. Train him to do what? To think of his unit ahead of himself. And to remember the Code. Which was? Unit, Corps, God, country. Even Kaffee had a problem with that concept. Weinberg could have told Kaffee what the problem was. It was all too pat, too neat. As if Dawson were reciting a litany.Only Weinberg wouldn't realize the full implications until two days later. Why? Because as he told Kaffee later, I believe every word of their story. And I think they should go to prison for the rest of their lives. Kaffee did come to see him later, in preparation for their very early trip to Gitmo. He said the judge advocate, Captain Jack Ross USMC, had up and offered Kaffee twelve years. And it had taken all of forty-five seconds to get it. Take it, Danny, he said. It's a gift! But Kaffee was still dubious. Why? Because Ross had said a strange thing to him: He said Dawson's platoon leader, Lt. Jonathan Kendrick, held a meeting of the men and specifically told them not to touch Santiago. So? I didn't mention Lt. Kendrick. I don't know who he is! Weinberg made one really dumb mistake, though it proved profitable later. He reminded Kaffee they had to wear Whites to Gitmo, on account of its tropical heat. Well, when they got there, their escort, Corporal Jeffrey Owen Barnes USMC, gave them camouflage jackets to cover those white uniforms. We're going to be close to the fenceline, sirs, and an enemy sees a man in a white uniform, he might figure it's a promising target. Good call, Sam! said Kaffee. And Weinberg noticed Commander Galloway, who'd insisted on accompanying them, had worn khakis, not The Whites.Col. Jessup, Lt. Col. Matthew Andrew Markinson USMC (the XO), and Lt. Kendrick all met them in Jessup's office. Weinberg noticed something just a little bit...off...about all three officers. Nothing he could put his finger on. Yet. But Weinberg got a really unpleasant taste of Jessup's manner at lunch that day. Jessup at one point said, You know, it just hit me. She outranks you, Danny...You're the luckiest man in the world. There is nothing on this earth sexier, believe me, gentlemen, than a woman you have to salute in the morning. Jessup went on to suggest Kaffee should let Galloway perform fellatio on him, a thing Weinberg had trouble even imagining Danny asking for, much less a senior officer suggesting it in front of them both. Jessup went on: Of course, my problem is, I'm a colonel. So I have to take cold showers until they elect some gal President, heh, heh, heh. If Jessup thought he could deter Galloway from asking probing questions, Galloway disabused him of that notion. So Jessup frostily said he would welcome any investigation she cared to launch. I eat breakfast three hundred yards from four thousand Cubans who are trained to kill me. So don't imagine for one second that you can come down here, flash a badge, and make me nervous! Kaffee himself came in for the Jessup Treatment, just for asking for a copy of the order to transfer Santiago off the base. It was lost on Weinberg that they didn't even know Santiago was due to be transferred on the night of the assault against him, until Jessup had mentioned it. But it wasn't lost that all Danny wanted to do was get a copy of the transfer order while they were there, and Jessup had gotten all huffy about it. I...want...you to stand there, in your faggotty white uniform, and with your Harvard mouth extend me some f***ing courtesy! You gotta ask me nicely! Wow. So The Whites had set Jessup off, had they? Or was it something deeper?They all returned to Washington, where Kaffee and Galloway conducted three more key meetings outside of Weinberg's presence:1. Interrogating Dawson again to learn the Lt. Kendrick had ordered Dawson and, presumably, Downey to give Santiago a Code Red.2. Driving a hard bargain with Jack Ross after learning about the order.3. Presenting a real cream-puff plea deal to Dawson and Downey--involuntary manslaughter, two years, home in six months--only to have Dawson and Downey reject it!Kaffee, exasperated, explained it to Weinberg and Galloway in his office. I don't believe it! he said. Dawson's going to jail just to spite me! I want to get him a new lawyer. How do I do it? When the judge asks you whether you want to enter a plea, said Weinberg, just tell him then you want new counsel assigned. Galloway was having none of that, either. She wanted the case to go to court, and she wanted Danny to stay with the case, let them be judged, and make an argument. An argument that didn't work for Lt. William Calley USA at My Lai, and an argument that didn't work for the Nazis at Nuremburg. Weinberg said so. Kaffee said, That's not the same as two teen-aged Marines carrying out a routine order they could never anticipate would bring harm! They're not the Nazis! Don't look now, said Galloway, but you're making an argument. Kaffee still begged off, though Galloway told him strenuously you know how to win, and then called him a used-car salesman and an ambulance chaser with a rank. The next day, Kaffee was almost too late for court. As per form, Captain Ross announced the case and the charges. The judge, Col. Julius Alexander Randolph USMC, turned to the defense table. Does the defense wish to enter a plea? he asked. Yes, said Kaffee. They're not guilty. Just like that! Yesterday he'd been begging off the case, and now he was standing up there like...well, like his father would have done!No one--other than the judge, who scheduled the case for 3 October--said anything more. Until Kaffee asked, Why does a lieutenant (junior grade) with nine months' experience and a track record for plea bargaining get assigned a murder case? Could it be so it would never see the inside of a courtroom? He issued rapid-fire orders. They would work out of his apartment every night at 1900. Jo should bring a carton of legal pads, half a dozen boxes of black pens, and half a dozen boxes of red pens. Sam was to bring two desk lamps. He wanted medical reports on Santiago and all the Proficiency and Conduct reports on Dawson, Downey, and Santiago. The only thing in my refrigerator is Yoo-Hoo and chocolate bars, so if you want anything else, bring it. OK? OK! said Galloway, smiling.And Kaffee said, So this is what a courtroom looks like! Weinberg's first task was to try to find Lt. Col. Markinson. Who had, unaccountably, gone UA shortly after his, Kaffee's, and Galloway's plane had left to go back to Andrews AFB (now known as Joint Base Andrews on account of handling Navy as well as Air Force missions). Weinberg's contact said that Markinson had vanished off the face of the earth, as he had the training--in counterintelligence--to do. The contact said he, Weinberg, could be Markinson and Kaffee would never suspect. Are you Markinson? Kaffee asked. Nope. I'm not Markinson. That's two down. Weinberg begged off, seeing how much JoAnne Galloway was now involved. The two men argued over the matter of Dawson and Downey having an order to obey. What's the secret, huh? Weinberg asked. What's the magic word? I give orders all the time. Nobody follows them. We have softball games and marching bands. They work in a place where you have to wear camouflage or you might get shot! Kaffee then said he did need Weinberg. You 're better at research than I am, and you know how to prepare a witness. Galloway arrived laden with medical reports and Chinese food.And so they fell to work.On 3 October the trial began. Things went reasonably well until the examination of Commander Stone, the medical director at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base Hospital. Kaffee objected, on the ground that Stone was an internist, not a criminologist. On cross-examination, Kaffee tried to get Stone to admit Santiago might have had coronary artery disease and that, not any poison, might have caused his lungs to bleed. Then on the redirect, Jack Ross asked, In your expert medical opinion, was Santiago poisoned? Galloway tried renewing the objection, and then said The defense strenuously objects! By the time she was through she had the judge roaring at her that he considered the doctor an expert! Weinberg rounded on Galloway, prompting Kaffee to say, Sam, she made a mistake. Let's not relive it. And then Galloway asked Weinberg, Why do you hate them so much? Weinberg roared out why.And Kaffee said, Everyone take the night off. Weinberg tried to apologize, but Kaffee said, We've been working twenty-hour days for three and a half weeks. As good a reason as any.After Kaffee left, Weinberg asked Galloway, Why do you like them so much? Because they stand on a wall, she said, and they say, 'Nothing's going to happen to you on my watch.' Well, well. Galloway did not join out of some feminist imperative to prove women were as good as men. She reverted to the vestiges of civilian female fan-girl-ism when it came to looking at a recruiting poster. And Weinberg had to admit: Dawson and Downey were recruiting-poster Marines. Lamely he said, Don't worry about the doctor. Our turn starts on Monday., Kaffee began by examining Cpl. Barnes, and drawing out from him a sympathetic portrait of the Code Red practice--as a punishment symbolic of, therefore befitting, the offense. Gilbert and Sullivan would have been proud.That night, lo and behold, Markinson came back! Danny had gone out to buy a newspaper, then found himself having Markinson for a passenger. Jo used her clearance code to get Federal marshals to guard Markinson. In the meantime, Weinberg drew the detail to get the tower chief's log at Gitmo to show a flight departing for Andrews at 2300 6 September. Which was seven hours earlier than the 0600 flight that was supposed to have been the first available flight to ship Santiago out.Weinberg sat through Kaffee's hostile-witness examination of Kendrick. It was a sight to behold. Weinberg had thought Lionel Kaffee was the best trial lawyer that ever lived. Now he knew if he needed a lawyer, he'd pick the younger Kaffee over the elder any day of the week and twice on Sunday. Even though Danny had failed to shake Kendrick out of his lie, that cross-ex was one of the best cross-ex sessions he had ever seen.But when he, Weinberg, got the tower chief's log, it didn't mention any flight leaving at 2300. Danny went off to see Markinson about it, then came back with a theory that Jessup had doctored the logbook and probably gotten his friends at Andrews to doctor that logbook, too. But Danny was sure Downey's testimony would be enough.It wasn't. Because as it turned out, Downey wasn't even in his room when Kendrick had ordered Dawson to give Santiago the Code Red. Downey had acted on Dawson's orders, not Kendrick's.Danny was late to their after-court session. And when he came back, he was plastered. And he revealed the second piece of horrible news: Markinson was dead. Suicide.Jo then suggested they ask Judge Randolph for a continuance, to subpoena Col. Jessup. Danny wouldn't hear of it. He then became terrifically angry, despite Weinberg's best efforts to calm him down. Finally he threw a lot of papers off their work table. Jo then got her coat and stepped out to walk home in that driving rain shower.Weinberg started to pick up the fallen papers. Danny, thoroughly morose, said, I'll bet your father bores the [censored] out of his buddies. 'Sam's made Law Review. Sam's making an argument!'' I think my father would have loved to see me graduate from law school. Weinberg then assurerd Danny he was a better lawyer than his father ever had been. And though he, Weinberg, would never put Jessup on the stand, and neither would the elder Kaffee, neither Sam Weinberg nor Lionel Kaffee is lead counsel in the case of United States v. Dawson and Downey. So the question is: what are you going to do? Danny decided he would put Jessup on the stand. And they both jumped into Danny's car to find Jo, bring her back--and let her get dry after being out in the rain.The next day, Danny was practically climbing the walls. He was sure he could get Jessup to just blurt it out. I think he wants to say it. I think he's p***ed off he has to hide from this. I think he wants to say he made a command decision, and that's the end of it. Then, in imitation of Jessup, he went on, He eats breakfast three hundred yard away from four thousand Cubans who are trained to kill him! And nobody's gonna tell him how to run his unit! Least of all the Harvard Mouth in the Faggotty White Uniform! I need to shake him, put him on the defensive, and lead him right where he's dying to go. And how?When Danny went into his closet to retrieve his softball bat, he knew how. As part of it, he gave Weinberg an assignment: go out to Andrews, pick out two members of the night ground crew, and have them in court, in Class A uniform, ready to testify. It didn't matter they couldn't testofu to a frigging thing. Just their appearance might be enough to put Jessup on edge.Weinberg got in, with an Airman O'Malley and an Airman Rodriguez. Just in time. Kaffee hit Jessup, first of all, with this discrepancy: Santiago was supposed to get on a plane at 0600 7 September. But all his belongings were hanging neatly in his closet or folded equally neatly in his footlocker. Nor had Santiago made a single telephone call the night before. In contrast, Jessup, on getting the subpoena, had packed a bag and made three phone calls, for a day trip!Kaffee introduced the tower chief's logs, showing no flight. And said he would be calling Airmen O'Malley and Rodriguez to give an account of a flight that never was. But then Kaffee got to the real meat of his case: if Jessup had ordered Kendrick to pass on that Santiago wasn't to be touch, and Jessup's orders were always obeyed, why did Santiago need to be transferred?Kaffee then presented the suggestion: Lt. Kendrick had indeed ordered the Code Red, because Jessup had ordered that. And when it went bad, Jessup cut those boys loose. Getting Markinson to sign a phony transfer order five days after Santiago died. Doctoring the logbooks. Coercing the doctor to talk about poisoning without a scintilla of toxicological or other evidence. Then, with Smilin' Jack and the judge both trying to shout him down, he cried out, COLONEL JESSUP! DID! YOU! ORDER! THE CODE RED?!?And Jessup said, You want answers? I think I'm entitled to them. YOU! WANT! ANSWERS?!? I WANT THE TRUTH! YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH!!! cried Jessup, who then tried to justify himself for a full minute. Weinberg found all his earlier hatred of Dawson and Downey transferring to Jessup. Jessup had given the order. Jessup had ordered two decent men to torture and torment a weaker kid.And at the end, Jessup not only admitted that. He avowed it. Loudly.At Danny's suggestion, the court removed the members to an anteroom and convented an Article 39A session. During which Captain Ross Mirandized Jessup. Who then lunged at Kaffee and made a definitely Not Safe For Work suggestion of how he would love to summarily execute Kaffee. The MPs had to restrain him physically from attempting that very thing.In the end, Jessup marched out of the court, with the MPs flanking him.The court acquitted Dawson and Downey of murder and conspiracy, but convicted them of conduct unbecoming. The court sentenced them to time served and a dishonorable discharge.All things considered, that had been the best outcome those two could expect. For what they should have done--and this is what Dawson realized at the end--was challenge the order. It would have meant court-martial, but in the hands of a Danny Kaffee, they might have been acquitted and allowed to stay in the Marine Corps.Nevertheless, Sam Weinberg developed a deep and abiding respect for Daniel A. Kaffee as a lawyer. Show less «