“This continues for a couple of weeks, Sally doesn’t know for sure who the person is, but thinks it’s Monty. Jen had an ex-boyfriend who began to stalk her after she broke up with him. Jen moved to London to escape him; she even changed her last name. Sally thinks he must have tracked Jen down. Sally doesn’t know where she’s being held, but it’s not at the coffee shop, the smells aren’t right. Sally thinks it’s a house and she’s kept downstairs but not in a basement. Her room gets light through a small window in the morning and she can hear the creaking of the floorboards above her. Sally believes the house is either isolated or sound-proof, because she yelled the first day of her captivity and there was no response outside the house. Jen finally told her to keep quiet or it would go badly for them.
“More weeks have passed, and Sally’s now freed in the morning, but only so she can make Monty a hot breakfast and a large lunch to be consumed later. Monty stays in the kitchen to watch her every move and Sally is kept locked up the rest of the day. She doesn’t know what they do for dinner, Sally continues to receive a bowl of canned soup. His description will be in the written report.
“One morning, Sally sees a convenience store receipt stuck to the sweat on the milk container, I’ll provide details on the written report. In the weeks since Sally began to make breakfast and lunch, she only sees Jen on the nightly trip to the bathroom. Jen’s right forearm is in a cast and she shields her torso as if her ribs are injured. Sally didn’t hear an altercation which reinforces her suspicion that her room is sound-proofed, or it could have occurred elsewhere. Sally’s recent memories are the same routine of getting up, making breakfast and lunch, then returning to the room for the rest of the day. Psycept reading complete.”
I turn off the recording equipment and open the Psycept case. My written report will be short and provide details for the London and SWACon police to follow up on. Monty is white, just below six feet tall with shoulder-length dirty blond hair, blue eyes, and a slight beer belly. The date printed on the receipt is January 22nd at 11:33 p.m. at the Pack ‘n Stack at Talbot and Brownwood. The items listed are a gallon of milk, orange juice, a tin of ground coffee, and a case of beer. The person that went to the convenience store is probably Monty, maybe he’s still on video and CCTV can trace his path to the house. Sally doesn’t know what happened to her car or if anyone knows about her delivery to the coffee shop. Rather, she knows the family is aware of her baking business, but she doesn’t think they know the names nor addresses of her clientele. I provide the address to Jen’s coffee shop as the point of origin of the investigation as well as a description of Jen. The police can check with urgent care clinics or emergency departments to see if a woman matching Jen’s description came in for treatment recently. I also include the description of Sally’s car and plates.
I finish uploading the report and marked the case complete from the Psycept perspective, then I look to see which detective is assigned this case. When a non-police petition is accepted by a Psycept, a police report is generated for our police to reference, though they usually just wait to receive the case notes from the Psycept who handles the petition. A petition from a police department is treated a bit differently due to the chain of evidence process, therefore the PPD are more aware of petitions sent in by other police departments. Since the Sarah Lee Henderson, or Sally as she prefers to be called, petition was sent by her children, I doubt the Psycept detective has read her case. As the case has some urgency associated with it, I call the detective first. No answer, it just rolls to voicemail with a generic greeting. I pull up the PPD email system to view the out-of-office message, but none is listed. What if she’s in training but didn’t mark her communication as out-of-office? Time to make a nuisance of myself.
“How’s tricks, Gray?”
“Hi, Mark, sorry to disturb you. Can you tell me if Detective Watkins is in training and if anyone is assigned to cover her? I am calling about a case she is attached to.”
“Watkins, yes, she’s on the board for training this week. What’s the case number, I’ll see who’s covering it,” I give him the police case number now that we’re able to see it. Before, I would give the Psycept database case number, which they had to look up in a separate window to get the corresponding police case. Very clunky. “It’s Detective Bodaway, do you want me to transfer the call?”
“No, just give me the extension in case I have to call back, please. Also, were the detectives in training instructed to provide their back-up’s information while they are in training?”
“Extension’s 4671. And kind of. The detectives have their cases split up between three or four detectives for coverage purposes. The out-of-office message is supposed to indicate the main detective is in a meeting and unavailable, but that emails and messages will be responded to by the appropriate covering detective.”
“I’ll give Detective Bodaway a call first. Time to make a new friend.”
“Good luck with that.” I thank him before hanging up, then
