Chapter 12
2114words
“Hi, Janice.”
Cassidy was nearly two-hours into her workday when a call came into her station from Dr. Janice McCullough. She saw her name in the caller ID.
“Hi, Cassidy,” Janice returned. “I heard you were back at work and I thought I should give you a call.”
Cassidy thought the last part of Janice’s greeting was unusual. They were friendly with each other, but she never thought of Janice as a close friend and assumed that as a mutual truth for them both. The absence of a call from her over the past twelve days kind of confirmed that thought for Cassidy, so she had no reason to expect a personal call from her now.
“Yeah, I came back Monday, but I’m on desk duty until the end of the shooting review.”
“That’s standard procedure,” Janice replied sympathetically.
There was a momentary awkward silence that followed causing Cassidy to believe that there was more to her call than a welcome back greeting. After coming to that conclusion, Cassidy resolved to draw out her real reason for calling.
“Is there something I can do for you?”
“I wasn’t sure if I should bother you with this,” Janice hesitantly began. “This is something that I’ve been sitting on for more than a week.”
“And what is that?” Cassidy encouraged.
Janice paused momentarily then decided to continue.
“I saw the doctor’s report on Albert Haynes. They noted something that—surprised me.”
“What?” Cassidy asked with concern.
“The attending doctor noted that Haynes had a pair of tiny puncture wounds, slightly more than an inch apart, on the inside of his right arm, just above the wrist.”
Cassidy needed to hear no more to understand why Janice had called. The wound she described was similar to the wounds found on five of the nine bodies found in the Greenbelt and in identical locations on two of them.
“The injuries were well into the process of healing,” Janice continued. “It was an incidental notation. The doctor thought nothing of it. I only mention it because it caught my attention.”
“Did you examine the wounds?” Cassidy asked sharply.
“On what grounds?” Janice questioned back. “The injuries played no part in his death. They were at least a day old and they appeared to be superficial.”
“They sound like a match for wounds found on some of the Greenbelt victims,” Cassidy sternly insisted.
“I knew you were going to say that,” Janice mildly retorted. “That is why I was reluctant to tell you.”
“You should have called me, Janice,” Cassidy argued into the phone.
“The case is closed, Cassidy,” Janice responded. “You killed the guy.”
“There could have been accomplices,” Cassidy disputed. “We have to examine those injuries.”
Janice hesitated to respond. She had anticipated everything Cassidy had to say. It was an obvious coincidence, but the similarities of the wounds were not enough to convince her that there was a connection. She had no reason to believe that any of the nine victims were killed by such an injury, and Albert Haynes clearly was not. The only thing that made any of the injuries objects of interest was the absence of an explanation for them.
"I told Lt. Graham about the wounds and he dismissed them," Janice reported in her defense.
"This is my case," Cassidy rebuked. "You should have called me."
Cassidy knew that there was little to no chance of examining Haynes’ injuries now that he was interred. She already knew that Lt. Graham was not going to support a request from her to exhume Haynes’ body. And she believed it even less likely that the precinct captain would agree to it without Lt. Graham’s endorsement. Cassidy was frustrated with the whole situation.
“I thought I should tell you, and I did,” Janice offered apologetically. “If you can get Albert Haynes’ body exhumed I will be happy to examine it. But I can’t support a request to do that without some evidence that links his injuries to the deaths of the Greenbelt Nine. I’m sorry.”
Janice excused herself from the call and went back to work. After hanging up, Cassidy mulled over the news from Janice then went back to processing paperwork that other detectives did not have time to do.
Cassidy was not convinced that the puncture wounds on the Greenbelt Nine, or on Albert Haynes, was germane to the crime she was investigating. But coincidences were annoyances that she felt a need to resolve or prove to be irrelevant before letting them go. In this case, the puncture wounds had yet to meet either one of her criteria. Despite her irritation, she put the matter behind her and concentrated onto her duties at work and the list of names she got from David Burrell. Nearly an hour later, a new report was brought to her attention.
“Cassidy,” Nina Chan called as she snatched open the Information Technology Room door and stepped into the hall.
Cassidy was moving through the precinct outside of the IT room when she was stopped by Nina’s call. She turned back toward the precinct’s technical analyst and watched as she raced toward her with a sheet of paper in her hand.
“Hi, what’s up?” Cassidy asked as Nina stopped in front of her and extended the paper.
“Last Tuesday I did some test calls in the Newtown area that you were interested in,” Nina began excitedly.
Cassidy took the sheet of paper and began examining it as Nina continued. Printed on the paper was a map of a half mile square area in Brooklyn.
“And I’m ninety-five-percent sure that I know which building those calls you were asking about came from.”
“You do?” Cassidy questioned back as she continued to examine the paper.
“Yeah,” Nina returned with a wide smile and pointing at the paper.
“Is this an apartment building?” Cassidy asked as she continued to study the paper.
“No, it’s a warehouse,” Nina answered.
Cassidy continued to study the map and pondered aloud: “A warehouse?”
“That’s it. I’m sure of it,” Nina insisted with a nod. “You see; I did some test calls all around this area. And I noted the towers that were handling the calls and the differing signal strengths from each location. By comparing the signal strengths recorded by the towers for each location I was able to shrink the area where the calls originated. This is the place. I’m sure of it. I would have brought you this sooner, but I had to wait for the phone companies to pull...”
“Damn!” Cassidy broke in with frustration.
Nina was startled a little by her sudden burst of aggravation. She stopped in mid-sentence to give Cassidy a surprised look.
“What’s wrong?”
“Sorry, I’m just upset about this whole situation,” Cassidy explained.
Nina had expected her report to be welcomed information. The fact that it was not made her wonder if she had done something wrong.
“What situation? I thought this was what you wanted.”
“It is,” Cassidy assured her. “I’m just pissed off about having my hands tied.”
Nina had no idea why Cassidy was angry. Her mind was always focused on providing the answers to questions that the detectives put to her. How that information was used was often of no interest to her.
“So, this doesn’t help you?” Nina questioned.
“Yes, yes it does,” Cassidy spouted apologetically. “I’m going to look into it. It’s just these prepaid phones. I’m certain that the answers I’m looking for are hiding behind them and the Lieutenant is preventing me from getting around them.”
“Well prepaid phones are anonymous,” Nina explained. “You can’t get around that. The carriers don’t even know who owns them.”
“I don’t think I need them to know,” Cassidy mused out loud.
“Why is that?” Nina asked.
“I think the people using them may be buying them in bunches—three, four, five at a time. Which would make sense because they only use them for a short time, a month at the most, and then they discard them. And if that is true, then the last phone that my suspect uses has a good chance of being the last phone in the lot to be activated.”
Nina’s face lit up with understanding.
“So, all you need to find that phone are the serial numbers from that lot. If you had those, it would be a simple process of elimination.”
“I wouldn’t even have to wait for the last phone to activate. I could just filter out the phones already discarded and then search for any cellphone in the lot that only make calls to burner phones.”
“So, the person you’re looking for is almost certain to have the last two or three cellphones from the lot to go active,” Nina added with sudden awareness.
“Precisely,” Cassidy agreed.
Nina took a moment to assess the plan. She concluded that it was doable.
“So why aren’t you doing it?”
“I’m on desk duty for one,” Cassidy explained, tossing her hands. “I’m not supposed to be working cases. A second reason is the subpoena I would need to match the electronic serial numbers with mobile identification numbers. The Lieutenant would never sign off on that. In his mind, this case is closed.”
“So, you’re working a case that you’re not supposed to be working,” Nina pondered out with confusion and surprise.
“Yeah,” Cassidy admitted in a word.
Nina gave Cassidy a sly look with a barely contained a grin.
“Well, I might be able to get those numbers for you.”
“What?” Cassidy quickly returned.
“Yeah, there might be a way,” Nina returned with a contemplative look and a nod of her head. “But I don’t think you’ll be able to use the information as evidence in a trial.”
“Wait, wait,” Cassidy jumped in with a shocked expression. “You’re saying that you can get the information without a subpoena?”
“Maybe, yeah,” Nina confirmed with a nod and a shrug.
“Wait,” Cassidy challenged with disbelief. “I’ve dealt with phone companies before, and they don’t give up anything without a subpoena, and the majority of the time they devote weeks to fighting those.”
“Well, that was your problem,” Nina returned with a smile and a pleased-with-herself expression. “When you come at the phone companies with subpoenas, that brings the lawyers into the room.”
Cassidy was taken aback by Nina’s confidence. Nina continued to explain.
“This isn’t top secret information. They’re not hiding it in a vault. That’s just quality control records. If you go into the head office with a subpoena, they’re going to think trial, publicity and damage to the brand. Now, if you go in through a side door and convince the right person that there won’t be any of that, then they just might be willing to let you take a peek at what’s lying around on their desk.”
“And you know someone like that?” Cassidy questioned with hope and surprise.
“Hey, this is my bailiwick,” Nina professed with a wide smile. “Just give me a few days to look into it and I’ll see what I can do.”
“Nina, you’re a treasure,” Cassidy proclaimed with excitement.
“Thank me later,” Nina quickly pushed back. “This isn’t written in stone.”
“I have faith in you,” Cassidy insisted with a grin on her face.
Cassidy was overwhelmed with excitement. She turned away and hurried back to her desk eager to investigate the warehouse where the Newtown calls originated. But the possibility that she might learn the new number that one or more of her suspects were now using was the icing on the cake. She hoped that information would unveil the secrets the prepaid phones were concealing. Her need to know and understand what had happened overruled all other concerns and considerations. The names that she got from David Burrell the night before became a secondary issue. They were just more people she had to investigate. She believed the warehouse had the potential to give her some answers to the mystery she was immersed in.
