In the first part of The Lincoln Lawyer season 2, we saw the scales slightly tilting towards the prosecutors as Andrea Freeman and her team found a pair of gardening gloves from Lisa’s place that had the victim’s blood on them. Mickey knew that it was going to be an uphill battle from here on, and he would have to play his best game if he wanted to win the case. Though Mickey was fighting with all his might for Lisa, there were times when he had doubts about her intentions, as she often withheld a lot of information from him. The entire chapter of Henry Dahl had made Mickey a little suspicious, but still, his affection for Lisa helped him overpower all the doubts he had about her. The only hope that Mickey had as of now was that he would be able to somehow prove that Alex Grant had a strong motive to go after Mitchell Bondurant and that he wanted to pin the entire blame on Lisa Trammell. So, let’s find out what happened in The Lincoln Lawyer Season 2, Part 2, and if Mickey Haller is able to prove that his client is not guilty.
Spoilers Alert
How did Mickey trick Alex Grant?
Mickey had been assaulted in the parking garage, and the contract signed between Henry Dahl and Mickey also went missing. Izzy found Mickey lying in an unconscious state near his car, and she immediately took him to the hospital. Izzy felt guilty as it was her partner who had given the keys of the Lincoln to Henry Dahl, and she went up to Mickey and told him that if he wanted, he could fire her. But Mickey did no such thing because, for the upcoming battle, he needed loyal soldiers by his side, and Izzy was by far the most trustworthy companion he had.
Meanwhile, in The Lincoln Lawyer Season 2 Part 2, Cisco kept doing his investigation, and it was found that Henry Dahl and Alex Grant did have a connection. One of Henry’s executive producers, David Webber, was the president of a shell company owned by Alex Grant. Mickey had a hunch that Henry Dahl and Alex Grant were together in this, and he wanted to find a way to bring Alex Grant to court. Mickey coerced a client named Sam to make a fake website and allure Alex Grant to come and buy a painting that he had been quite interested in owning for quite some time. Alex Grant fell for the trap, and when he came, he realized that it was all a sham and that he was merely called so that his fingerprints could be used to indict him in the ongoing case of Mitchell Bondurant.
Alex Grant moved a motion to quash the subpoena, and Mickey formulated a risky strategy, knowing that if it paid off, he would be able to drag Alex into the trial. Mickey’s entire case depended on what legal recourse Alex ended up taking and if he pleaded the fifth or refrained from doing so, and fortunately, he didn’t, and he withdrew his motion. Alex Grant wanted to prove that he was not involved in any kind of suspicious activity, as stated in the mail that was sent to him by Mitchell Bondurant on January 10, earlier that year. Mickey’s bluff paid off, but the judge told him that he still needed to connect the dots and that his theatrics wouldn’t help his cause. Mickey still needed a strong piece of evidence that proved that Alex Grant had a probable motive to go and kill Mitchel Bondurant, and considering how cautious this man was, Mickey knew that it wouldn’t be so easy to find anything against him.
In The Lincoln Lawyer Episode 7 of Season 2, someone left an FBI target letter on Mickey’s doorstep, and he knew that it could give him the much-needed breakthrough that he had been looking for quite some time. Mickey consulted Legal Siegal, and he realized that he could use the target letter for his cause and prove that Alex Grant was not exactly a nobleman if he could verify the authenticity of the target letter. An agent named Felix Vasquez had signed it, and Cisco was given the job of finding out if the letter was legitimate or not. Though Felix Vasquez didn’t explicitly say anything to Cisco, it was enough to prove that the letter was legitimate. Felix was called to the witness box and made to testify. Andrea Freeman tried her level best to point out to the jury that just because a target letter was sent to a person, it didn’t mean that they were necessarily involved in some illegitimate practices. But Mickey knew that he wouldn’t let this opportunity pass him by, and he did manage to raise concerns about Alex Grant’s intentions and motives.
Mickey set up the stage quite well, and he predetermined the moves and countermoves that would put him ahead in the game. Mickey was able to prove that Alex was still in touch with his father, Sasha Kazarian, who was serving his time in prison. After asking Cisco to track Alex’s movements, Mickey showed the court how Alex, after visiting his father in prison, always went to his uncle’s place, who had also been an active member of the crime syndicate back in the day. Mickey presented photographs as evidence in court in which it was seen that the truck of the courier company, co-owned by Alex and his uncle, was seen near Mitchell’s parking lot minutes before he was murdered. As a result, Alex Grant pleaded the fifth during the trial, which made it look like he was not exactly as clean as he was pretending to be and that he was involved in some sort of unscrupulous activities that he didn’t want to come out in the open.
How did Mickey prove Lisa Trammell’s innocence?
The murder weapon was finally found, and from that point on in the case, Mickey entirely changed his strategy. He accepted that the murder weapon belonged to Lisa Trammell and that the gloves on which Mitchell’s blood had been found were also Lisa’s. Andrea was a bit surprised by his moves, and even the judge asked him if his client was on board with whatever he was doing. Mickey’s strategy was very straightforward, and he was aiming to achieve two things out of it: first, he didn’t let Andrea’s witnesses give their testimony and influence the decision of the jury, and second, he wanted to establish that Lisa Trammell was being framed by someone else. Mickey knew that he didn’t need to prove Lisa’s innocence; he just needed to establish that the evidence against her wasn’t conclusive.
Andrea tried to prove that Lisa Trammell lost her temper more often, and she got Lisa’s neighbor to testify about it. She even proved in court that one of Lisa’s employees had stopped working for her because of her bad behavior. Andrea did have a strong case, and she was able to show that at one point in time, Lisa was keeping track of the movements of Mitchell Bondurant too, but the entire theatrics pulled off by Mickey in the end, when he brought Alex Grant to testify, proved to be a bit more compelling than what Andrea had. The basic thing was that nobody had the evidence to conclusively prove anything. Yes, there was a murder weapon and blood-stained gloves, but that didn’t mean that it could be said for sure that it was Lisa who had used them to murder the victim. The doubt had been successfully cast, and in The Lincoln Lawyer season 2, Lisa Trammell was found not guilty by the jury.
Did Lisa Trammell kill Mitchell Bondurant?
After the case ended, Mikey found out that Walter Kim, who had come to testify in court earlier, might have been paid by Alex Grant to kill Mitchell Bondurant. Andrea Freeman also came and told Mickey that the shard of glass was from Kim’s car, and the sheriff’s department also found traces of Kim’s blood on Mitchell Bondurant’s boots. Andrea told Mickey that this was one of those rare cases when he might have been defending an innocent person. Mickey did think about going after Kim, but then he thought that it would just be a waste of time and energy as his client was already free and Alex Grant would eventually face an inquiry from the FBI. Suspiciously, Walter Kim’s car was found in a parking lot in Marina del Rey, but there was no sign of the man. According to Cisco’s theory, Alex Grant killed Walter Kim because he wanted to hide his tracks, though Mickey knew that he didn’t have the evidence as of now to prove that theory. It was an established fact that Alex did bribe Kim for not exposing the irregularities of his construction projects, but whether he asked him specifically to kill Mitchell was still unknown.
But there came a twist during The Lincoln Lawyer season 2’s ending, when Mickey found out that the man who had come to his office and who posed as Lisa’s husband, Jeff, was, in reality, a chef who used to work in Lisa’s restaurant back in the day. Jeff Trammell had filed for divorce 11 years ago, but surprisingly, he had withdrawn his request. Then suddenly, after that, he had gone missing, and now that Mickey had realized that Lisa had sent an imposter who was posing as her husband, he knew that there was something not right about the entire facade. Mickey went to confront Lisa, and meanwhile, Lorna informed Detective Raymond Griggs to come and search Lisa’s place. Mickey realized that Lisa had killed Jeff and buried his body in her backyard. In the next season (if there is one), we will get to know if Mickey’s speculation is true or not, but seeing the conviction of the Lincoln Lawyer, we believe that Raymond will definitely find something there. As far as Mitchell Bondurant is concerned, Lorna had her doubts about Lisa, and she did believe that she was the one who had killed the businessman. Mickey also knew that there was something off about Lisa, but as of now, both Mickey and Lorna didn’t want to go down that alley, probably because they knew that Lisa would anyways be convicted of murdering Jeff.
Final words
Though there hasn’t been any formal announcement of season 3, we believe that there will definitely be one, considering Mickey Haller has a new case to crack. In the last moments of The Lincoln Lawyer season 2, Mickey got a new case where a man named Julian Lacosse, who was being held at the West Hollywood Sheriff’s Station had asked him for help. Mickey went to meet him, and surprisingly, Julian told him that his friend Giselle Dallinger had told him that if he was ever in trouble, he should contact Mickey Haller. Julian told Mickey that Giselle was dead and that authorities were blaming him for murdering her. Mickey went to the mortuary to check who this Giselle was, and he was shocked to find out that it was none other than Glory Days, aka Gloria Dayton.
So, the stage is pretty much set for another invigorating trial that will be full of drama and suspense. Maybe while handling Julian’s case, Mickey would also find evidence that would prove that Lisa Trammell was not innocent, and she was behind the murder of Mitchell Bondurant. We will have to wait for The Lincoln Lawyer season 3 to find out why Gloria was killed and if Mickey is able to prove that Julian was innocent.
