Max was typing away. “Looking good. Just want to make it sound like we’ve done our homework. And what about the two drugs in Equivan?”
Rogan looked up the information for Equilibrium and Flovan. Ellie laughed as he struggled to pronounce the drug’s ingredients. He finally gave up and turned the screen toward Max.
“Got it. And the companies who produce the drugs?”
Ellie recognized the names of two large pharmaceutical corporations. “Does the judge really need to know all this?”
“Hopefully not. My worry is that the judge will want us to pull in the drug companies, too, in which case we’re looking at months of stalling. We only have four days to make a decision on Casey.”
“Would they really care about two patient records?”
“If the drug companies are funding the research, they might have privacy interests at stake: confidential business information, proprietary research and development stuff, etcetera.”
Rogan was still surfing for additional information to fatten up the warrant application. “Based on Bolt’s history, I’d say the likelihood of private funding’s high.” He swung the laptop back toward Max and Ellie.
“The Blood Pact Between the Psychiatric and Big Pharm Industries.”
It was a post from two years earlier on a website called Healthcare Is a Right. The author purported to document the incestuous relationship between pharmaceutical companies and the psychiatric industry. The American Psychiatric Association was phasing out the funding of its trade conventions by drug companies to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest. The decision followed a multipart expose in the New York Times highlighting the millions of dollars’ worth of perks flowing to the very doctors responsible for writing the prescriptions that fueled the burgeoning business of psychopharmacology.
At the bottom of the post was a list of the twenty “poster children” for the “blood pact” between psychiatry and “big pharm.” Number twelve was Dr. David Bolt, thanks primarily to the research money he’d received from drug makers in recent years.
“This is interesting,” Rogan said, scrolling back up into the heart of the article. “It says here that in the wake of the recent controversy, the leading med schools required their faculty and attending physicians to disclose to their boards of trustees all income received from private sources. Looks like Bolt resigned his appointments at NYU and Harvard rather than comply with the new regulations. Apparently most of his research is sponsored by pharmaceutical companies.”
Ellie had never had occasion to think about the sources of funding for drug research. “That’s ridiculous that companies control the testing of their own drugs.”
“Given these days of reduced spending, who else is going to pay?” Max said. “One blogger says David Bolt is the medical equivalent of a war criminal, but New York magazine lists him as one of the top child psychiatrists in the city.”
“But it’s not just a matter of opinion if Bolt’s research is being funded by the companies that manufacture Equilibrium and Flovan. Bolt said Equivan was about combining the best of two treatments. Obviously both companies would have an interest in the tests going well. More kids medicated means more drugs sold.”
Max was too busy reading his own composition on the screen to continue following her rant. “Let’s just stick to Casey and Brandon’s files for now, okay?”
Ellie thought there was more to the story, but she also knew that an investigation into a drug company’s research practices would take far longer than the few remaining days they had to make a decision about Casey Heinz’s guilt. Not to mention that the last time she checked, drug research protocols were well beyond the NYPD’s jurisdiction. She’d have to settle for a phone call to the Food and Drug Administration. Hopefully they’d see the same red flags.
“The request for Casey’s records is pretty tight,” Max noted. “He’s a suspect in Julia’s murder. We’ve got his lawyer telling us he’s in this study, and we’ve got the shrink telling us that manic depression could be relevant to both the murder and his disposition on the night of the arrest.”
Rogan slapped his palms and then rubbed them together. “All right, then. Let’s get this show on the road.”
“But you’re also looking for Brandon Sykes’s records.”
“And we’ve got it all spelled out here.” Ellie reached around Max for the keyboard and scrolled down to the relevant paragraphs of the affidavit. “If Brandon lied to get into the study, then we need to know that before you put him on the stand. Conversely, if he is manic-depressive, then Bolt says it’s possible he’d be more likely to lie to us. It’s relevant either way. We lay that all out here.”
“Except the records won’t actually tell us if he lied to get into the study. We don’t even know if he’s in the study. It might be too tangential. And if the judge thinks we haven’t done our work on the Sykes part of the warrant, he might ding us on the request for Casey’s records, too. I don’t think we can risk it.”
“So what choice do we have?”
“Talk to Brandon Sykes first, just to be safe. At least see what he says, so I don’t look like an idiot when the judge asks me.”
Ellie looked at her watch. “It’s already seven o’clock. Unless Bolt takes appointments on the graveyard shift, we won’t get to Brandon and a judge and to Bolt’s office tonight. You only have four more days before the clock runs out on Casey’s hold.”
“I know, but if I go to a judge now and get slammed, it’ll be even worse. Go find Brandon.”
Chapter Forty
Chung Mei Ri was not happy to see them.
Even when Gundley’s people had stormed into Promises with Casey to search his room, Ms. Ri had been exceedingly polite to Rogan and Ellie, despite her displeasure. She offered them coffee and joked that they worked even longer days than she did. She also told them they were wrong about Casey. She insisted that this was all a misunderstanding and that they would see they were mistaken. But she maintained the same calm voice and warm smile throughout the encounter.
Today, though, something had changed at the Promises Center for Young Adults. Same welcoming glass atrium. Same girl with the pink mohawk stationed out front. Same Ms. Ri charging into the lobby with her no-frills suit and black stockings. But this time there was no warm smile. And the calm voice had been replaced by a low hiss.
“I tried to tell you. I tell you that Casey is innocent. I tell you I know he could not hurt a flea.” What had been a faint accent grew stronger as she seethed. “I also tell you about Brandon Sykes and Vonda Smith. I do not like to say bad things about the people we are helping here. It goes against everything we stand for. But I did it. I told you about them so you would know not to trust them.”
“We’re still looking at the case, Ms. Ri. The DA’s office has a few days before convening a grand jury. That’s why we’re here to talk to Brandon. We’re still gathering information.”
“Thanks to you, there is no Brandon. There is no Vonda or Brandon or Casey.”
“I’m not sure what you mean, Ms. Ri.”
“What were you thinking, giving them that kind of money?”
“We didn’t give them anything. Julia Whitmire’s parents-”
She waved an irritated hand at them. “You, the parents. You work together. What were you thinking? I turned her away last night because she causes so many problems. Then today he comes back and takes all of his things.”
Ellie was having a hard time following her from one sentence to the next. “Brandon left because Vonda couldn’t stay here?”
“I don’t know if that was his reason or not. But ten thousand dollars to two drug-addicted children? He says he doesn’t need to be here anymore.”
“Who said that? You mean Brandon?”
“Yes. Brandon. They got their reward money. They’re gone, Detectives. He said they were going west. Until they shoot up all of that money or die, they’re gone. I hope you’re happy with yourselves.”
