This crackling, authentically drawn courtroom drama finds San Francisco's assistant D.A. Dismas Hardy immersed in not one but two murder trials when he discovers the severed hand of a billionaire inside the belly of a dying shark & later represents the murder suspect.
Ex-cop, part-time investigator, and sometime bartender Dismas Hardy returns to face a death threat as he investigates the bloody disappearance of his friend Rusty Ingraham, an investigation that exposes foot-dragging police, corruption and an enforcer named Johnny LaGuardia.
Dismas Hardy is an ex-cop and bartender at the Little Shamrock, owned by his friend Moses McGuire. When Moses asks him to investigate the alleged suicide of his brother-in-law, Eddie Cochran, Dismas obliges. Though Dismas's probing suggests that Eddie was involved in a drug deal, he begins to uncover a dangerous entanglement much closer to home.
Wes Farrell begins the job of district attorney for the city of San Francisco and immediately sinks into a nightmare case. Roland Curtlee, a man in jail for 10 years for the rape and murder of a woman, has his case thrown out. While waiting for a new trial, the judge grants him bail, a move that sends shock waves through both the local community and the legal realm.
Hardy's best friend, Lieutenant Abe Glitsky, has kept a secret from him...and everyone else. Hardy never knew that Abe had a daughter-until she was shot dead. It seems obvious that the heroin addict hovering over her body with a gun is the guilty party, and Glitsky has few qualms about sweating a confession out of him. But there is more to this murder-much more. And as both Hardy and Glitsky risk their lives to uncover the truth, others are working hard to stop them.
