Attorney Jay Lillie’s newly-released novel, Justice, opens with the death of a young journalist in Chicago, but the story quickly twists and turns its way to Washington, D.C., where the mystery of the young man’s untimely death becomes part of a deeper political secret.

Justice is largely based on what the author describes as a little-known fact: that the Constitution does not require U.S. citizenship of Supreme Court justices. Although the book begins as Chicago detective Julia Gold attempts to solve a seemingly random murder in Chicago’s southside, much of the action takes place in Washington, as presidential and congressional insiders — including Katherine Stevens, a law clerk at the Supreme Court — discuss the recent judicial appointment of Justice Joan Chartier.

Lillie manages to weave both plot lines together almost effortlessly, though readers may begin to wonder what progress Detective Gold is making in Chicago; action in the middle portion of the novel resides solely with Stevens in Washington.

Overall, Justice is an intriguing page-turner, offering readers a diverse and engaging cast of characters and a thought-provoking legal mystery. Lillie explores several different aspects of the legal world, first through the eyes of Stevens as she clerks for a Supreme Court justice, then through Gordon Cox, an attorney and unofficial advisor to the President during the Senate Judiciary Confirmation Hearings. Lillie’s legal experience is apparent as he discusses the fictional hearings in detail, offering a behind-the-scenes look at what goes into appointing someone to the position of U.S. Supreme Court Justice.

The 250-page novel — available in both paperback and electronic formats — can be purchased through Amazon and other major booksellers for $15.

Annie Butterworth Jones is an associate editor for The Florida Bar News and Journal.

The New President, whoever it is, will need to confront a growing set of connected problems in our own backyard. These involve the extra-territorial ambitions of Russia, China, Hugo Chavez and the Castro brothers. These ambitions affect every nation in the Western Hemisphere, and are concentrated at the moment within the Caribbean.

The Caribbean Sea can be bisected by a line drawn between two very strategic points . . . Guantanamo Bay in the far Northeast and the Panama Canal in the extreme Southwest. The Canal is owned by Panama and operated by China. Guantanamo Bay, an unusually deep and well-protected harbor, is under lease from Cuba to the United States for use as a naval base. It’s no secret that we’re using it for other things.

If you bisect the Caribbean on the other diagonal from Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula in the West to Venezuela in the East you get a much longer line that envelopes Columbia, Venezuela, and all of Central America in the southern half. It is this half where the largest of the current risks lie, just as it is on the Guantanamo/Panama line where the conflict will play out a few years from now.

Let’s take the immediate first. Castro and Chavez are at the center of a propaganda campaign being waged by those two with Russia. At the same time, emboldened by their new wealth and spurred on by Nato’s spreading its wings into Eastern Europe, Russia is arming Chavez with warplanes and missiles. Cubans can still remember the Russians from their partnership in the 1960’s and 70’s, and, while that memory is not sublime, the Russian flirtation plays into Castro/Chavez anti-US propaganda.  The people of both these countries apparently need a constant reminder that Washington is at the root of all their problems – not Bolivarian socialism.

China has been making deal after deal in Latin America . . . mostly trading rights for the raw materials they know they’ll need in the future for cash, of which China has plenty.  They’re also involved with Cuba to drill for oil off the coast, and with Venezuela to widen the Panama Canal.

Havana is entwined with Hugo and his attempts to spread the Cuban form of Bolivarian populism (communism) to South and Central America. To date, the effort has gained traction in Bolivia, Uruguay, Honduras, and Nicaragua; came very close in Mexico and Brasil; and the vote is still out in Argentina and Peru. The U.S. Congress hasn’t helped by refusing to affirm the treaty with Columbia on Democratic/Republican political grounds. We’ll explore this populist movement in the coming weeks, look at the effect it will have on all U.S. citizens, and what the new President will need to do to enhance our influence in the region.

If he can establish a leadership posture in this Hemisphere, we may be able to avoid the strategic risks involved in having both the Panama Canal and the Guantanamo Bay facility outside our sphere of influence (or needing a military solution to avoid such an outcome). 

Jimmy Carter in Havana . . . where he certainly was this week . . . why was he there? My guess . . . to see what kind of deal could be made with Castro and particularly . . . what if we give Guantanamo Bay back to Cuba the way Jimmy Carter did with our bases in Panama?

The reason I know truth is stranger than fiction is that you can’t make these things up. The general plot of my next novel . . . Washington trying to make a deal with Havana, and the chaos that follows. Jimmy may have beaten me to it.

Maybe Carter’s trip to Havana was an attempt on Obama and Hillary’s part to get around the provision in the Helms/Burton law that prohibits anyone in our government from doing it until the claims of Cuban Americans against Cuba are acted upon.

So . . . what’s the answer in these times of popular uprisings?

Easy . . . Congress should scrub the Embargo against our own people completely and let American business go to Cuba and open up shop. Congress can do this unilaterally . . . then we’ll see how long Cuban Communism and Raul can last. He’ll be coming to Washington on his knees to reinstate the Embargo.

Alex Santiago is a composite of three persons I got to know in Miami during my book tour promoting Havana Passage. Alex is a citizen of the United States, but his family comes from Cuba. He knows a bit about the Castro brothers and about life in Cuba during his parents time and more recently. After seven months of the Obama Administration I revisited my composite, Alex, to get his side of the story

I asked him:

Do you see any progress in our leaders in Washington understanding what has to be done in Cuba?

“I do not. The failures go back through seven Presidential Administrations, and as many Congresses. I hoped we might see some improvement from the latest crowd on Capitol Hill, but what I see is worse. Barack Obama is letting the far left make the case for him that communism in Cuba has a good side. His agenda, I fear, is to use Cuba to advance his own ideas elsewhere, including here at home.”

So what’s the answer?

“The answer to finding a route to freedom for the people of Cuba is not to let our elected officials or our bureaucrats in Washington get involved trying to make deals with the Castro regime. They don’t know what they don’t know, and they’re unlikely to listen and learn. Why should they . . . they already know everything. Raul and his henchmen will take them to the cleaners.”

That’s a bit hard, isn’t it? What’s the alternative to sending our politicians and bureaucrats down there to jawbone Raul Castro?

“Congress can and should unilaterally scrub the embargo against U.S. citizens doing business in Cuba. Then we sit back and see what the Castros do.”

They won’t let us in.

“Why not?”

They don’t want real business to take hold

“Exactly. Business requires freedom to make decisions, and this can transform Cuba the way it did Eastern Europe and is doing in China; or the Castro regime will need to take excessive measures to keep U.S. business out, which in turn will result in their eventual overthrow from within . . . also as occurred in Eastern Europe. All Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton need to do is stand tall and keep Hugo Chavez and his buddies from the mid-east and Russia from moving to support Cuban Communism 90 miles off our shores.”

Then what?

“The process will take time, but not anywhere near the 25 years our current policy has had to fail. Part of the answer is to admit there’s no quick fix for the right outcome.”

That doesn’t sound like Congress.

“If you mean will the current crowd in the White House take this step? Not likely, for two reasons: If the key persons in our own government don’t support capitalism here, why would they foster its growth in Cuba? The second reason is that our legislators and bureaucrats, like most everywhere, believe in the governmental approach to solving all problems . . . They think meeting with their counterparts in Havana, people with whom they share a common self-importance and whose top-heavy perspective they can understand, is the way to go”

You’re not at all optimistic

“It doesn’t help that all we hear in the press these days is what a wonderful leader this man Fidel Castro has been, that Hugo Chavez is a hero for overcoming previous American animosity and the CIA, and that Raul Castro is making the right changes to free-up the Cuban society”

That’s a bit of an exaggeration, isn’t it?

“Not really. Please don’t misunderstand me, but every time I see Barack Obama making one of his ongoing, powerful, flowery speeches to rally his supporters, the picture of a younger Fidel Castro on the pulpit in Revolutionary Square comes back to haunt me. The European left sees this and smiles. Remember, Fidel didn’t come out of the communist closet until after he’d conned everyone and had solidified power, then he took no prisoners. Old, and now infirm, he still doesn’t.”

Alex Santiago is a composite of three persons I got to know in Miami during my book tour promoting Havana Passage. Alex is a citizen of the United States, but his family comes from Cuba. He knows a bit about the Castro brothers and about life in Cuba during his parents time and more recently. After seven months of the Obama Administration I revisited my composite, Alex, to get his side of the story.

Do you see any progress in our leaders in Washington understanding what has to be done in Cuba?

“I do not. The failures go back 25 years through seven Presidential Administrations, and as many Congresses. I hoped we might see some improvement from the latest crowd on Capitol Hill, but what I see is worse. Barack Obama is letting the far left make the case for him that communism in Cuba has a good side. His agenda, I fear, is to use Cuba to advance his own ideas elsewhere, including here at home.”

So what’s the answer?

“The answer to finding a route to freedom for the people of Cuba is not to let our elected officials or our bureaucrats in Washington get involved trying to make deals with the Castro regime. They don’t know what they don’t know, and they’re unlikely to listen and learn. Why should they . . . they already know everything. Raul and his henchmen will take them to the cleaners.”

That’s a bit hard, isn’t it? What’s the alternative to sending our politicians and bureaucrats down there to jawbone Raul Castro?

“Congress can and should unilaterally scrub the embargo against U.S. citizens doing business in Cuba. Then we sit back and see what the Castros do.”

They won’t let us in.

“Why not?”

They don’t want real business to take hold.

“Exactly. Business requires freedom to make decisions, and this can transform Cuba the way it did Eastern Europe and is doing in China; or the Castro regime will need to take excessive measures to keep U.S. business out, which in turn will result in their eventual overthrow from within . . . also as occurred in Eastern Europe. All Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton need to do is stand tall and keep Hugo Chavez and his buddies from the mid-east and Russia from moving to support Cuban Communism 90 miles off our shores.”

Then what?

“The process will take time, but not anywhere near the 25 years our current policy has had to fail. Part of the answer is to admit there’s no quick fix for the right outcome.”

That doesn’t sound like Congress.

If you mean will the current crowd on Capitol Hill take this step? Not likely, for two reasons: If the key persons in our own government don’t support capitalism here, why would they foster its growth in Cuba? The second reason is that our legislators and bureaucrats, like most everywhere, believe in the governmental approach to solving all problems . . . They think meeting with their counterparts in Havana, people with whom they share a common self-importance and whose top-heavy perspective they can understand, is the way to go.”

You’re not at all optimistic.

“It doesn’t help that all we hear in the press these days is what a wonderful leader this man Fidel Castro has been, that Hugo Chavez is a hero for overcoming previous American animosity and the CIA, and that Raul Castro is making the right changes to free-up the Cuban society.”

That’s a bit of an exaggeration, isn’t it?

“Not really. Please don’t misunderstand me, but every time I see Barack Obama making one of his ongoing, powerful, flowery speeches to rally his supporters, the picture of a younger Fidel Castro on the pulpit in Revolutionary Square comes back to haunt me. The European left sees this and smiles. Remember, Fidel didn’t come out of the communist closet until after he’d conned everyone and had solidified power, then he took no prisoners. Old, and now infirm, he still doesn’t.”

His nose twitched and he wickedly winked at me. “Come on Big Boy, give it up.”

How much?

“What you got?”

Twenty Five cents. Will that do it?

“What you think, Big Boy?”

I don’t know. I’m from Missouri.

“You certainly are not from Missouri. You from D.C., Big Boy.”

Okay, so how much?

“All the Kings Horses, and all his woooo-men.”

I don’t have any horses.

“You got no woooo-men either, Big Boy.”

So what do you want from me?

“A license.”

To do what?

“Anything and everything: To spend your money; make you pay and pay; mortgage your children’s lives; give my friends what they want; buy your vote; send you packing; tie your hands; and bury you on the lone prairie.

Not much room in there for what I might want. I thought you were on my side.

“What side be that?”

Aren’t we on the same side here? It’s all one country.

“You don’t really believe that, do you?”

Who do you think you are, anyway?

“Exactly. Just check your vote at the door, and get the HELL out of here.”

No. I’m not giving you my vote, and you’re the one who’ll be leaving.

“You can’t get rid of me. I’m in the details.”

I should have known . . . the devil’s always in the details.