shortly. Which meant that players for the Sixers, Eagles, Phillies, and Flyers were all sweating big time.
'I've got some serious time on this,' Byrne said. He knew that he had to play the game, and he was as good as anybody at it. Probably better.
'I know, Kevin. And I apologize. The Fontana case is high priority, and you know how things go. People forget, people run, people mysteriously disappear. Especially with a drug-homicide case.'
Byrne understood. The passions on a shocking and bloody case such as the Fontana ran high.
'What are we looking at?' he asked.
Drummond checked his BlackBerry. 'The jury will be back on Robles in three days when they meet again. I promise.'
It might not matter. Byrne knew that Philadelphia had a way of solving its own problems.
'Thanks for meeting with me, Michael.'
'Not a problem. Are you coming to my party?'
'Wouldn't miss it.'
They shook hands again. 'Don't worry about a thing, Kevin. Not a thing. Eddie Robles is history.'
Byrne just stared, impassive. 'Keep me posted.'
Byrne thought about heading to the Roundhouse, but he wasn't expected for a while. He had to think. He drove to York Street, parked across from the alley down which Eduardo Robles had walked.
Eddie Robles is missing.
Byrne got out of the car, looked up and down the street. A half- block away he found what he was looking for, something that he had not noticed before.
There, high above the sidewalk, glancing indifferently down at the street, was a police camera.
Chapter 8
The Homicide Unit at the Roundhouse was a study in controlled bedlam. There were ninety detectives in the unit, working three shifts, seven days a week. The first floor was a winding labyrinthine warren of half-round rooms which made it a real challenge to place desks, file cabinets, computer tables — in other words, everything that might be needed in an office. Not that anyone went out of their way to give even a simple nod to the concept of decor in this place.
But there was a system, and that system worked. Philly Homicide had one of the highest solve rates of any homicide division in the country.
At noon, with most of the detectives at lunch or on the street, Jessica looked up to see Dana Westbrook crossing the room.
Sergeant Dana Westbrook was the new day-work supervisor, taking over for the retired Ike Buchanan. In her late forties, Westbrook was the daughter of a retired police inspector, and had been raised in Kensington. She was a Marine veteran of Desert Storm.
At first glance she was not the most intimidating figure. With her bobbed cut, just turning gray, and measuring in at just over five-four, she towered over no one. But she was in great physical shape, still adhered to the Marine circuit-workout four days a week, and could outrun and outperform women on the force half her age, as well as many of the men.
Being a woman in what was still and would probably always be a boys' club, her military training came in handy.
As in all police departments, indeed any paramilitary organization, there was a chain of command. From the commissioner to deputy commissioner, from chief inspector to staff inspector to captain, all the way to lieutenant and sergeant, then detective, officer, and recruit, it was a highly regimented institution. And shit, as they say in the military, doesn't flow uphill.
From day one, Dana Westbrook took a lot of shit.
When a call came in during day work — the eight a.m. to four p.m. shift — the desk detective took the information and brought it to the supervisor on duty. It was then the supervisor's job to initiate and coordinate the first crucial hours of the investigation. A lot of this involved telling men — some of whom had been in homicide for more than twenty years, all of whom had their own way of doing things, certainly their own pace and rhythms — where to go, who to talk to, when to come back. It involved judging their fieldwork, sometimes calling them on the carpet.
For male homicide detectives, who felt as if they were the Chosen, having someone tell them what to do was not an easy pill to swallow. To be told by a woman? This made the medicine bitter indeed.
Westbrook sat next to Jessica, opened a new file, clicked her pen. Jessica gave her the basic details, starting with the anonymous 911 call. Westbrook made her notes.
'Any sign of forced entry to the building?' Westbrook asked.
'Not sure. The place has probably been broken into many times, but there was no new splintering on the jamb.'
'What about vehicles parked near the scene?'
Jessica noticed for the first time that, besides her modest earrings, Dana Westbrook had four empty piercings in her right ear. 'We're running plates in a two-block radius, along with the vehicles parked in the school parking lot, cross-referencing the owners with wants and warrants. Nothing so far.'
Westbrook nodded, made a note of it.
'And we could also take a look at some of the footage our budding
Oscar winner took. I saw Albrecht getting some shots of the crowd across the street.'
'Good idea,' Westbrook said.
Sometimes a criminal, especially one guilty of murder, returned to the scene. Police were always aware that a crowd at a crime scene, or one gathered at a funeral, might contain the person they sought.
'And speaking of Albrecht, how much access does this kid get?' Jessica asked.
'Within reason,' Westbrook replied. 'He doesn't get inside the ME's office, of course. Or a hospital.'
'And why are we doing this, again?'
'He's the deputy commissioner's wife's cousin's son. Or something like that. He's plugged in, let's just put it that way. The deputy commissioner is a Penn State grad, you know.'
'Is Albrecht allowed to film a crime scene?'
'Well, word is, the brass is going to see a rough cut of this film and has final approval over it all. If anything compromises an ongoing investigation or is blatantly disrespectful to a victim or a victim's family it won't see the light of day. You can count on that.'
'So, we have the right to chuck him off a scene?'
'Absolutely,' Westbrook said. 'Just make sure Kevin doesn't do it when you're going seventy on 1-95.'
Jessica smiled. It hadn't taken long for Sergeant Dana Westbrook to get up to speed. 'I'll make a note.'
Westbrook stood. 'Keep me in the loop.'
'You got it, boss.'
Until they got an ID on the victim there wasn't too much they could do. The faster you got an ID, the faster you could get information such as where the victim lived, worked, went to school, played, and the faster you could begin to collect witness statements. Once identification was made, a person was also run through the various databases, specifically the National Crime Information Center and its local version, the Philadelphia Crime Information Center.
The victim was fingerprinted as soon as the body got to the morgue, but all you could do before identification was canvass the area around the crime scene, process any forensic material, and hope for the best. If they couldn't ID the victim, the best hope was that by the next day someone would have heard the news about the body and would start making calls about their husband, brother, son.
After finishing her initial report, Jessica would head back to the scene. People working early shifts would be getting home soon and just might have something to tell her.
She made a note to ask Kevin to reach out to a friend of his, a detective who worked out of South Detectives. The more eyes and ears on a homicide, especially at this stage, the better. Divisional detectives knew their turf and
