He returned the empty gun to the drawer.
At five-fifteen Thursday morning, Fletch was in his office at the
for 1st Thurs. p.m. BODY FOUND w/cuts: R. Sanders Fletcher
The nude body of a 15-year-old girl was discovered buried in the sand off Shoreside Blvd., The Beach, by police this morning.
The body was found encased in a sleeping bag in a shallow grave in the shade of the sea wall as the result of a tip from an anonymous caller.
The body has been identified as that of Roberta “Bobbi” Sanders, believed to be originally from Illinois.
It is expected that, in his report, coroner Alfred Wilson will estimate the time of death sometime late Sunday night or early Monday morning and the cause of death as an overdose of drugs.
According to a police spokesman, the sleeping bag is a popular brand and there is little expectation it can be traced to its owner.
The girl, abandoned at The Beach by a 30-year-old male traveling companion some months ago, had no known local address.
Her friends are not known to police.
She had no known means of support.
The anonymous caller this morning was described by police as “probably male.” It is reported by the receiving officer that an obvious attempt was made by the caller to muffle or disguise the voice.
The Beach police are making every effort to locate the girl’s family in Illinois.
It is believed her father is a dentist.
for 1st Thurs. p.m. (fp) POLICE CHIEF IMPLICATED Fletcher w/exhibits: 1) Montgomery affidavit; 2) Witherspoon affidavit; 3) Cummings’s handwritten note— enclosed, captioned w/cuts: Cummings, Witherspoon, Montgomery—u have in rack.
The
The evidence includes: an affidavit signed by Charles Witherspoon, alias Vatsyayana, alias Fat Sam, who identifies himself in the affidavit as “the disseminator of [illegal] drugs in The Beach area,” an affidavit signed by Lewis Montgomery, who identifies himself in the affidavit as “the drug runner to Fat Sam,” and a handwritten note to “Sam” regarding drug-running problems signed “Cummings.”
These affidavits identify Chief Cummings as the source of illegal drugs in The Beach area.
The affidavits are dated with yesterday’s date.
This morning, The Beach police discovered the body of a 15-year-old girl, Roberta “Bobbi” Sanders, buried in a shallow grave near the main sea wall at The Beach, dead of a drug overdose. (See related story.)
The evidence implicating Cummings is the result of a special investigation by the
Both Witherspoon and Montgomery were placed in protective custody before noon today.
The arrest of Chief Cummings by federal narcotics agents is expected later today.
According to the affidavits, Cummings, 59, under the guise of establishing a home in Mexico preparatory to his retirement a year hence, has been smuggling drugs in from Mexico on a monthly basis for more than four years.
Street prices for these drugs have totaled as much as $75,000 a month.
Cummings’s personal car, which he used on his frequent trips to Mexico, is a late-model dark blue Chevrolet sedan, with plates front and back reading “Chief of Police.” The car is equipped with a police radio. A rotating, flashing light similar to those used on official police cars is on the roof of Cummings’s privately owned car. A high- powered Winchester rifle is slung beneath the dashboard.
It is unknown whether Cummings also wore his police uniform while going through customs.
It is known that his wife and teenage daughter frequently have made the trip with him.
Cummings has been a member of The Beach police force 19 years. Prior to his police career, he was a career non-commissioned officer in the U. S. Army.
Montgomery is the son of James Montgomery, superintendent of schools at The Beach.
According to the affidavits, town police regularly would pick up young Montgomery for “questioning.”
Once alone in the office of the chief of police, the transfer of drugs for cash would take place between Montgomery and Cummings.
Montgomery states the belief these transactions were completely unknown to other police officers.
Montgomery would transfer both drugs and money in a money belt concealed beneath a loose Hawaiian shirt.
Pretending to make a purchase of drugs from Witherspoon, Montgomery would in fact drop the drug-laden money belt in a place prearranged for Witherspoon to find it.
Although the widespread presence of illegal drugs in The Beach area was visible, the method of how the drugs came to be in the area was invisible.
An earlier drug-runner, a 19-year-old simply identified in the affidavits as “Jeff,” reportedly committed suicide four years ago.
The handwritten note allegedly from Cummings was written at the time of “Jeff’s” suicide. It refers to the problem of replacing “Jeff” as a drug-runner by Montgomery.
According to his own affidavit, Montgomery has been running drugs since the age of fourteen.
Originally, when it was time for another transfer, Montgomery would signal Cummings by leaving his bicycle chained to a parking meter visible through the window of the office of the chief of police. The bicycle had a distinct, purple banana seat and a high rear-view mirror.
Later, the signal that Montgomery wanted to be “picked up for questioning” so a transfer of money for drugs could take place would be his parking a flower-decorated Volkswagen minibus within sight of the police chief’s office window. The vehicle is registered to Witherspoon.
Witherspoon, 38, has been living apparently undisturbed by police in a lean-to on the beach for years.
He identifies himself as a former music teacher with the Denver, Colo., public school system.
In his affidavit, Witherspoon states that he and only he has been selling the drugs supplied by Cummings in The Beach area.
Both Witherspoon and Montgomery state they had no share in the profits from the illegal drug trade. Self- attested addicts, they profited only by having their own drug needs supplied free of charge by Cummings.
They both attest that they were forced to continue in this traffic by Chief Cummings, who threatened them with evidence in his possession that they had been involved in drug-dealing.
Witherspoon had sold drugs illegally in The Beach area before becoming an agent of the police chief.
Witherspoon stated, “I was as much a prisoner of the chief of police, both by my need for drugs and by evidence he had on me, as I would have been if I were sitting in the town jail.”
As chief of police, Cummings had refused offers of assistance from private sources to have the town’s drug problems investigated by outside experts. Such a repeated offer by John Collins, chairman of the board of Collins Aviation, was repeatedly refused.
According to Collins, Cummings always insisted he was “within a few months” of breaking the case.
He made a similar insistence to the
***
After handing in the originals and duplicates of both stories to the copy desk of the afternoon newspaper, Fletch spent time identifying the photographs he had ordered processed two days before and drafting captions for them. The photographs were of Roberta Sanders, Police Chief Graham Cummings (which had been in the
He Xeroxed two copies each of the affidavits and Cummings’s handwritten note and turned both copies over
