Chapter 6 - The Liquidation on State Street
Six weeks after the eviction on Commonwealth Avenue, the first heavy blizzard of January coated downtown Boston in twelve inches of clean, pristine white snow.
In Courtroom 4B of the John Adams Courthouse on Somerset Street, the corporate receivership and civil bankruptcy proceedings of The Commonwealth of Massachusetts versus Harwood Development Corporation were entering their final thirty minutes.
The room was vast, lined with two-story dark mahogany wainscoting, fifty-foot ceilings, and the Great Seal of the Commonwealth mounted behind the elevated judicial bench of Chief Justice Margaret Campbell.
Sitting at the defense table was Adrian Harwood.
He was unrecognizable from the dazzling young developer who had adjusted his platinum cufflinks at the St. Regis six weeks earlier.
He wore an orange, state-issued corrections jumpsuit, heavy steel transport chains shackled around his waist and ankles, his hands secured to an iron belly belt. He had lost thirty pounds in the county jail; his dark hair was shorn close to his skull; his right knee remained locked in a heavy medical brace; and his eyes were hollowed out by forty days of sleeping on an iron bunk in the maximum-security tier.
Beside him sat his court-appointed public defender—a young, exhausted attorney who had spent three weeks reviewing the twenty-four thousand pages of forensic accounting records before advising his client to accept whatever criminal plea the state offered to avoid a thirty-year sentence.
Vanessa Cole sat three seats down, also in an orange jumpsuit, her wrists cuffed, her honey-blonde hair unwashed, staring down at the polished wood of the table, having already entered an unredacted proffer agreement that guaranteed her five years at the Massachusetts Correctional Institution in Framingham.
Sitting at the petitioner’s table, dressed in an impeccably tailored navy wool suit over an ivory silk blouse, her dark hair swept up into an imperial chignon, was Mara Sterling Vance.
Beside me sat Director Helen Shaw and Marcus Vance, their gold fountain pens poised over the master restructuring decree.
Chief Justice Campbell adjusted her spectacles, looking down from the bench with cold, unyielding severity:
"We are on the record in Case Number twenty-six, Commercial Insolvency Docket four-hundred-twelve," the judge announced, her baritone voice rolling through the courtroom like an iron bell.
"The court has reviewed the master receivership disposition, the criminal restitution stipulations, and the forensic bankruptcy filings executed by the court-appointed trustee."
The judge looked directly at Adrian:
"Mr. Harwood, you have executed an unconditional, permanent surrender of all common shares, corporate directorships, and development licenses in Harwood Development Corporation?"
"Yes, Your Honor," Adrian whispered, his vocal cords rough as crushed shale, his chin barely lifting from his chest.
"You have acknowledged that under Massachusetts General Laws Chapter Ninety-Three-A, the court has entered an absolute finding of gross corporate fraud, intentional diversion of municipal escrow funds, and aggravated embezzlement, barring you from serving as an officer of any public or commercial entity within this Commonwealth in perpetuity?"
"Yes, Your Honor," Adrian wept, tears leaking from his bloodshot eyes, dripping onto his orange jumpsuit.
Chief Justice Campbell picked up her heavy wooden gavel:
"The corporate dissolution of Harwood Development Corporation is confirmed," the judge announced.
"All commercial real estate assets, development rights, and municipal harbor permits are transferred in fee-simple absolute to The Atlantic Legacy Public Housing Trust, to be managed under the permanent executive supervision of Chairwoman Mara Sterling Vance."
The judge slammed her gavel down with concussive finality:
CRACK.
"The sixty-million-dollar civil restitution judgment is ratified. The criminal proceedings will commence in the Superior Court on March fourteenth. Court is adjourned."
Two armed state troopers stepped forward, hauling Adrian to his feet by his armpits.
As they turned him toward the secure holding cells behind the bench, Adrian twisted his head around one last time.
He looked across the well of the court.
His eyes met mine.
He saw my navy blazer. He saw the cold, unyielding sovereign steel in my posture. He saw the one-point-two-billion-dollar harbor regeneration project that he would never touch for a single second of his miserable life.
He didn't speak. He couldn't.
May you like
He lowered his head, his heavy medical brace dragging loudly against the hardwood floor, and shuffled through the steel door into the darkness forever.
I picked up my leather portfolio, turned to Helen Shaw, and walked out through the double mahogany doors into the bright winter sunlight of Somerset Street.
