The A.D.A.'s Ninth-Step amend / the dropped prosecution

timeline_event

pivotal · ~20 Nov YDAU

When: the A.D.A. has been outside Gately's room "off and on for three days"; scene POV is Pat, not Gately (scene dated "?/20 Nov YDAU")
What: The Assistant District Attorney for Suffolk County's 4th Circuit — the "guy in the hat" Gately fears — reveals to Pat Montesian that he is in Phob-Comp-Anon over his wife Tooty's dental-hygienic phobia/compulsion, which he blames on the "sick, twisted" toothbrush violation Gately did to them (event 26). Working his Ninth Step, he has tossed the Canadian-assault case file (declining to prosecute, for his own recovery) and needs — but cannot yet bring himself — to walk in and make Gately a direct amend. Consequence for Gately's arc: he will likely "two-step out of" probation-violation and prosecution — though Gately, feverish and unaware, separately imagines the A.D.A. praying he'll live so he can be sent to Walpole.