Mason insisted that every case begin with the same question.
What can actually be verified?
He had no interest in replacing one kind of blind certainty with
another.
Some applicants arrived with heartbreaking stories but no new evidence.
Others brought documents that had never been examined carefully.
The fund partnered with licensed attorneys and independent forensic
specialists.
Mason did not pretend to be a lawyer.
He understood records, systems, timelines, and the terrible cost of
assumptions.
That was enough to make him useful.
One afternoon Naomi brought him a copy of his original trial transcript.
Mason had avoided reading it since his conviction was vacated.
He finally opened it.
Page after page contained statements that once sounded absolute.
Mason had access.
Mason had motive.
Mason had created the vendors.
Mason had betrayed his father.
Now he could see how each claim had depended on another claim.
The case had looked solid because nobody had known what Arthur later
discovered.
