seen anything. When I interviewed her, she told me the same thing. But, running out of leads, I went back to talk to her again. I press her and, bluffing, I tell her that I know she was lying, that I know she’d heard the gunshots across the street and ran to her front window and got a good look at the shooter.
“We go back and forth, but I keep pressing and she keeps lying and denying. Finally, she admits that she saw a guy in a Shrek mask park the car and walk across the street. A few minutes later she heard a shot and saw him run back to his car and speed off. She insisted she never got a look at his face.
“But I know there’s one thing wrong with her story. No armed robber would pull up to the scene wearing a mask. That would draw too much attention. He’d only slip the mask on right before the heist. She realizes that I had caught her in a lie. Finally, she admits that she did get a look at him when he first pulled up.
“But she’s still too scared to cooperate with me. She’s got a daughter. Doesn’t want her involved in all this. Says she won’t look at any pictures I want to show her. So I tell her all about Sung’s kids, how they’re crying for their daddy every night, how tormented his widow is. I lay it on thick. Latisha knew the family, had frequently shopped at the market, and they were always nice to her. She finally breaks down. Says she’ll cooperate. She can’t ID the shooter, had never seen him before, but says she can definitely pick him out if she saw him again. But she knows that in her ‘hood, if word gets around that she’s cooperating with a detective, it’ll be a death sentence. She’s scared as hell now.
“But I tell her that I’ll move her and her daughter. I tell her I’ll protect her, I’ll keep her safe. So she agrees to look at stacks of pictures of local gangbangers and guys with armed robbery in their jacket that I want to show her.”
I closed my eyes and massaged them with my palms. “Three days later, she’s dead.”
“Why do you think you were responsible for her murder?” Blau asked.
“I know that just cooperating with me, agreeing to look at pictures, trying to pick someone out, puts her life in danger. So I go to the DA, submit my request for witness relocation funds, and request to move her. I want her out of the ‘hood. But without a positive ID on the shooter, their regulations won’t let me relocate her.
“She hasn’t IDed anyone yet, but I feel she’s still at risk. And she’s spooked, too, afraid to go home, but she doesn’t have the money to pay for the move herself. I promise to keep her identity secret. I meet with her at Felony Special-downtown-not at South Bureau where someone in the neighborhood could see her. Still, I know word sometimes has a way of getting out when a witness cooperates with the police. I go to the DA’s office again, really press the witness relocation coordinator, but he nixes the move. He says they can’t come up with money for people who might be able to ID shooters, who might someday be threatened. And LAPD regulations won’t let me relocate her without the DA paperwork.
“So I say ‘fuck it,’ find her an apartment in the West Valley myself. She sends her daughter to live with an aunt in Fresno. I pay first and last and security deposit out of my own pocket. I tell her to grab a few things, give the rest of her stuff to her mother, meet me out there, and not tell anyone where she’s gone. I tell her that within a few weeks, after I had shown her the picture of every gangbanger and armed robber in her neighborhood-and some surrounding ones-I’m confident we’ll have the shooter IDed. I’m sure asshole is a local boy who’s been collared before. I’d track him down, lock him up, and she’d pick him out of a live lineup-to really nail the case down. Then I could go through the DA’s office, get her and her daughter some funds for long-term relocation and maybe some job training. The Sung family would have justice. The wife wouldn’t have to worry about the killer coming back. And Latisha and her daughter could start a new life.”
I stood up and stared out the window, watching the cars stutter down Broadway. “Two weeks after I move her, someone kills her-I still don’t know where or how-and then dumps her body at Fifty-fourth and Figueroa-a block from the Sung’s market. Probably as a warning to anyone else who might have seen something the day he was killed.”
I fell back onto my chair and tried to stretch my neck, which was so tight I could barely move it.
“Why did the department come down on you?”
“Her family sued the LAPD. Because I’d given her the money for the move and found her the apartment, the LAPD, Latisha’s lawyers claimed, assumed responsibility for her safety. It was a liability issue. The city attorney settled before trial and paid Latisha’s family a nice chunk of change. The department was pissed. I got investigated by I.A. and Duffy hung me out to dry. Instead of arguing to the brass that I was just trying to protect a wit, Duffy suspended me. I was on my own.”
“I’ve heard of detectives doing things a lot worse, without being disciplined or having I.A. on their backs. All you did was come up with some money for her apartment.” Blau inched forward on the sofa. “So why do you blame yourself?”
“If I’d just stuck with regulations, maybe she’d be alive today. Maybe no one would have known that she’d seen the shooter. Maybe no one would have known she was cooperating with us. Instead, the shooter, somehow, found out.”
“How’d he find out?”
“Maybe he followed her when she drove out to the West Valley. Maybe someone saw us together at the apartment and word got out. Maybe when she made some calls, someone star eighty-nined her, found her phone number, and tracked her address.”
“Ash, that’s a lot of maybes. Too many for you to assume responsibility for her death.”
“I just know that what I did blew up in my face and my wit ended up dead. If I’d done things differently, the way I was supposed to, she might be alive today.”
“You’re being too hard on yourself. You did your best to protect her.”
I shrugged.
“It sounds to me that you did all that you could. I’d suggest you make a real effort to be as rational and realistic as you can about the situation. Because right now you’re over-assigning blame to yourself.”
“I had to do the death notification. When I told Latisha’s daughter her mother had been killed, well-” I swallowed hard and shook my head. “She blamed me. She was out of control. She screamed that I should have left her mother alone. I probably should have.”
“You need to focus on the reality of the situation. The reality is, this woman didn’t think she was safe where she was. Ultimately, you didn’t either. So you tried to protect her. The fact that you couldn’t keep her safe was not your fault. She might have been in danger no matter where she lived.”
“But I put her in danger.”
“You didn’t put her in danger. She was in danger before she even talked to you. She was in danger the moment she saw the man in the Shrek mask get out of his car. You can’t blame yourself, because when you moved her, you know what you were doing?”
“What?”
“Your job.”
“You know, whenever I’m in the middle of breaking down a case, I think of two phrases that always come up in Talmudic study: tsorikh iyyun — needing further study and b’makhloket — still in controversy.”
“Homicide detective as Talmudic scholar?” Blau asked, smiling wryly.
“I’m not giving myself that much credit. I’m just a cop who can’t leave a case alone.”
We sat in silence for a few minutes until I said the first thing that popped into my head. “Somewhere else in the Talmud it says something like, if you save a life, it’s like you saved the whole world. Sometimes I feel like that with my job.”
“You solve a murder, it’s like you’ve solved all the world’s murders?”
“That sounds like I’ve got delusions of grandeur.”
“Leave the psychological diagnosis to me,” Blau said, smiling. “But no one can dispute you have an important job.” Blau tapped his chin with his middle finger. “I get the feeling you’ve got something more to say about this woman, Latisha.”
I nodded.
“This is a good time to tell me about it.”
“I’ve got to be indirect about this.”
“Why?”
“I don’t want to lose my job. So let’s say there’s this hypothetical detective with a witness who-”
“We’re not here to talk about the hypothetical. We’re here to talk about you.”
“What are your rules about confidentiality.”
