I was the attorney of record for Rocket Packs girlfriend who lived with him in the house with the floor safe stuffed with cocaine, money, and drugs. She was also charged with Trafficking Cocaine, more than 100 grams, and facing the same minimum. mandatory twenty-five years, no probation, no parole. Her claim of ignorance as to her otherwise unemployed boyfriend’s drug dealing activities was seriously undercut by the cocaine, straws, and mirrors strewn about the house as well as the scrap book of photographs showing them partying, drinking Champaigne, and riding around New York City in a limousine. In truth, she knew very little about her boyfriend’s drug dealing enterprise and the prosecutor was willing to let her plead guilty not only to simple possession of the cocaine found in plain view during the search but to recommend probation too. She agreed to accept the plea understanding she would probably lose her teaching certificate but that was a bridge she’d already burned behind her anyway. I informed the Assistant Solicitor we had a deal and requested he put her on the upcoming guilty plea docket.
Her case was placed on the plea docket of Judge John Hamilton Smith, a no non-sense judge who wouldn’t have been my first pick to plea in front of, but, nevertheless, a judge I knew would accept the recommendation. I notified my client of the date and time for her plea and said I would meet her at the courthouse a half-hour beforehand to fill out the paperwork required for a plea. I figured to get our paperwork in early so we’d be in and out quickly but everything fell apart when we met at the courthouse and she told me she’d decided to reject the offer. I asked what happened to change her mind but she wouldn’t tell me. Out of frustration, I asked her how it felt to screw herself giving up a plea to a guaranteed walk when she was facing twenty-five years hard time. All she would say is the Lawyers of Islam were coming down to the courthouse to take over her case. I told her they’d better hurry because Judge Smith was taking the bench in fifteen minutes and was expecting her to plead.
A few minutes later Attorney Fred Henderson Moore, Sr., arrived at the courthouse. He was easily recognizable from the limited use of his arm and leg he’d had since birth. He was the last of twelve children born in 1934 during the Great Depression. I don’t know for sure, but from appearances he had cerebral palsy making his already hard life that much more of a struggle. Miraculously he thrived growing up in the Honey Hill subdivision of James Island. He was president of the Honor Society in his junior year and president of the student body in his senior year at Burke High School. He was one of only two African American students to take the college entrance examination the year he graduated. He was awarded the Danforth Foundation Leadership Award and offered scholarships to attend Carnegie Mellon and Harvard. Too poor to pay for travel expenses and books, he decided to attend South Carolina State in Orangeburg on a full scholarship.
Subjected to Jim Crow laws his whole life, he became a civil rights activist in college. He joined the NAACP’s effort to desegregate Orangeburg’s white schools after the Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board of Education decision in 1954. The school board denied the Petition and the White Citizens Council began targeting anyone who supported the petition for retaliation. Undeterred, Mr. Moore helped organize a boycott of Charleston businesses a year before the Montgomery, Alabama bus boycott following the arrest of Rosa Parks.
Orangeburg Representative Jerry Hughes, Jr., introduced a bill and the Governor sent SLED to investigate subversive activities on campus. Mr. Moore called the dean a moral coward for not supporting the students and was expelled from the college. Despite his expulsion, he graduated law school from Howard University and became a well-known civil rights and criminal defense lawyer. Fifty years later, South Carolina State University issued an apology and awarded him an honorary degree.
It was about that time I first had the occasion to appear in court with Mr. Moore when he represented a co-defendant in an historical drug conspiracy case before United States District Court Judge Sol Blatt. Judge Blatt was one of the most gracious judges I have ever appeared before but Mr. Moore wore Judge Blatt’s patience flat out by being chronically late for court. When he failed to show up at all for post-trial motions, Judge Blatt lost it and called him incompetent on the record. Realizing he’d given the defendant a guaranteed appeal for ineffective assistance of counsel, Judge Blatt continued the hearing and appointed Coming Ball Gibbs to represent the defendant who was given a sweetheart deal to sweep the whole incident under the rug.
And, here it was years later and Mr. Moore was arriving at the courthouse as a Lawyer of Islam.[1] He may have lost a step or two in the later years of his legal career but I can attest he remained fully competent on this occasion. I watched him interact with my recalcitrant client from down the hall and, as soon as he got the gist of what was going on, he backed her right up against the wall and gave her his Sharia Law advice in no uncertain terms. Immediately afterwards, he marched her straight into the courtroom to enter her plea.
Sadly, in later years, Mr. Moore would be reprimanded, suspended, and ultimately disbarred from the practice of law but, to my mind, that shouldn’t detract from the miraculous story of his early childhood and early career as civil rights and criminal defense attorney. I wish I could have known him back when he struggled to succeed and fought to preserve and protect all of our rights. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if more politicians today would take note and retire before old age tarnishes their legacies.
[1] It is curious how he became a Lawyer of Islam as there are several articles referring to Mr. Moore as the Reverend Dr. Fred Henferson Moore but I could find no record of his attending divinity school.
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