Ralph leaned over, and I heard him whisper to Lien-hua, “That really was a nice kick.”
I don’t think Margaret heard his comment, but she cleared her throat once again regardless. “With all due respect to the San Diego Police Department, so far all of their efforts to get Lewis to talk have been unproductive. However, in return for not pressing charges against Agent Jiang or filing a civil suit against the FBI or the SDPD, Mr. Lewis’s lawyers informed us this morning that he would talk, but only to Agent Jiang. He requested her by name.”
That’s what Lien-hua had told me on the phone while I was at Balboa Park talking with Tessa, but it didn’t make sense. “How does he know Lien-hua’s name?” I asked.
“Well, I’m just speculating here…” Margaret blew a channel of stiff air between her teeth, making the sound of a machine leaking steam. “Maybe his lawyers told him her name while they were encouraging him to press charges against her for assault and battery. Now, if we could get back to the reason we’re here, we need to make a decision-will we accept their offer or not?”
“That’s easy,” Lien-hua said. “We accept. I’ll talk with him. I’ll find out what we need to know-” “Excuse me,” said Detective Dunn. “We arrested this guy in our jurisdiction. This is a local law enforcement matter. We’ll take care of it on our own.”
“I’m afraid it’s not as local as it appears,” Margaret said. “Tell them about the DVDs, Detective Dunn.”
He sat staring. Wouldn’t respond.
“Go on,” said Margaret. “Tell them that your criminalists found seven DVDs in the back room of the warehouse, each with the video of another woman wearing a red evening gown drowning in that tank.”
I heard shocked murmurs ripple around the room.
Margaret’s eyes left Dunn and she addressed the group as a whole once again. “So far we’ve been able to identify women from three different states, based on missing persons reports since November.
We’re working to identify the other four women, but this is un-equivocally not a local law enforcement issue. This is a federal matter.
And that’s why the FBI has taken over jurisdiction of the case.”
Seven murders since November would be an average of one murder every week or two, a remarkably high number. Usually serial killers have a cooling off period in between crimes. But not always.
Jeffrey Dahmer, who killed seventeen people, Gary Ridgeway, who killed at least forty-eight, and the nineteenth-century Chicago busi-nessman Herman Webster Mudgett who may have killed over two hundred, all averaged a victim or more per week during certain months of their criminal career. I was thinking of these grim statistics when I noticed that Dunn’s hands, which had been lying flat on the table, were now curled into tense fists.
“Margaret,” I said. “Were the videos posted online?”
“I was getting to that, Dr. Bowers,” she said tersely. “The answer is yes. The cybercrime division is removing the links, shutting down the sites, but I’m afraid that already, over four hundred thousand people have watched those women die.”
Twenty-first-century rubbernecking. Just thinking about it made me sick. “Did the criminalists find DNA, fingerprints, any physical evidence tying Lewis to the crime?”
Margaret shook her head stiffly. “The water from the tank you blew apart washed away any evidence from the area surrounding the scene. Imagine that? And Mr. Lewis was smart enough not to leave fingerprints on the DVD cases or the cameras. We tried voice recognition with the video of Cassandra but came up dry since the only audio was heavy breathing. Right now, to build our case, we need this man’s confession.”
“Then it’s settled,” Lien-hua said. “I’ll do it.”
“Then it’s not happening here at police headquarters,” Dunn said, “unless we can have an observer, namely me, present.”
“Well, then,” said Margaret. “We’ll move Lewis to the FBI field office.”
The lieutenant, whom I assumed to be Graysmith, finally spoke up. “I’m not sure FBI Director Rodale would appreciate how this investigation is being handled, Executive Assistant Director Wellington.” He laced the words assistant director with rich sarcasm.
Hmm. Maybe I could learn to like this guy after all.
“I’d like a few things clarified…” he continued, “since the matter will likely come up this weekend while Director Rodale and I are on the links in Phoenix. Just so I’m clear, explain to me why we can’t have one of our detectives present for the interrogation of a suspect who lives in our city, kills in our city, and was apprehended in our city? I’m a little fuzzy on that part of this whole deal you’re striking with the suspect’s lawyers, and I want to have my facts straight when Director Rodale asks me to fill him in on the case.”
Margaret gave Lieutenant Graysmith’s words a moment of quiet deliberation, tapped the table twice with her index finger, and said,
“All right. Dunn, you observe. Lien-hua interrogates. And we put this guy away. I’ll have his lawyers draw up the papers relinquishing his rights to file any charges.” She glanced at her watch. “The interrogation will start promptly at 3:35 p.m., exactly fifty minutes from now. In the meantime, I want everyone in this room pulling up whatever they can on Mr. Neville Lewis so that our interrogator can go in prepared. This meeting is adjourned.” And then, as people stirred from their chairs, Margaret added, “Agent Jiang, I’d like you to remain for just a moment.”
73
While I waited outside the door for Lien-hua to appear, I asked Aina to follow up on Officer Geoff Rickman. “I think he was at the fire,” I said.
“Rickman? But Dr. Bowers, I’ve already spoken with him. His fingerprints were on the glove.”
“There you go. That’s him then. He was there.”
“No,” she said. “He wasn’t assigned to the fire, but he received the gloves from the two criminalists and delivered them to the evidence room. Officer Rickman says that he made a mistake and touched the glove. He apologized.”
I’m sure he did. “He stepped in Austin’s blood yesterday, Aina, and his shoe prints matched one of the patent prints left in the hallway. If he wasn’t assigned to the fire, it’s possible he was one of the people responsible for starting it.”
“You memorized the shoe-print impressions in the soot?”
“Of course.”
She paused for a moment. “Well,” she said. “I’ll see what else I can learn.”
“Thanks.”
She disappeared down the hall, and as I was considering the implications to the case if Rickman really were Monday night’s arsonist, the door beside me banged open and Lien-hua fumed into the hallway. “What is it, Lien- hua? What did Margaret say?”
She spun, her eyes narrow, her lips drawn tight. “Margaret said that even if Lewis doesn’t press charges, it doesn’t change what I did. She said she can’t have an agent in the field who cannot control herself. She told me that after the interrogation, she’s putting me on administrative leave. Indefinitely.”
“What? You can’t be serious?”
Lien-hua stepped away. “I’m going to get ready for the interrogation, Pat. I need some time by myself.”
Margaret wasn’t there last night. She didn’t see how things played out.
I thought back to the Sherrod Aquarium and the sharks’ feeding schedule. I wondered how long it would take them to devour a bony, forty-seven-year-old woman.
Tessa’s flight was supposed to have left thirty minutes ago, and the whole time she’d been waiting she’d been wondering just how long it would take before Patrick called to “monitor” her some more.
She figured that when he did, he would probably apologize all over the place for sending her back home.
Good.
He should.
She pulled out her cell phone and set it on her lap.
